LINCOLN FINANCIAL FIELD (Philadelphia) — Brian Schottenheimer wasn’t in a very good mood, which was odd since his Dallas Cowboys just stepped back from the edge of a cliff. The Cowboys' head coach seemed weirdly angry for someone who should’ve been celebrating. His postgame answers were unusually short.
"Definitely [a] hungry, pissed-off version of Shotty," Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott said. "It’s not like he’s naive." No, he’s not. So Schottenheimer surely knows that even though his Cowboys temporarily salvaged their season Monday night with a 38-21 win over the Philadelphia Eagles, he still has a lot of work to do if he’s going to save his own job.
Jerry Jones has spent a ton of money building a team that’s still under .500 nearly halfway through the season (3-4), and they're 1.5 games back in an NFC East that might be the NFL’s worst division and looks as wide open as it’s been in years. There’ll be no hiding and no excuses for Schottenheimer if these Cowboys don’t win it, especially after he said last week that, "I know what a great coach I am." If he doesn’t start proving it very quickly, he’s going to be out of a job. "It's not like he hadn't heard some noise about him," Prescott said.
"Whether it's calling the games or whatever doubt that's been out there. But we've got his back. He knows that.
He's a guy that takes a lot of pride in his job and a lot of pride in his team." That pride came through in the end on Monday night, but it certainly wasn’t easy. On a night that began with the Cowboys' 53-year-old coach reportedly being berated by a fan on the way from the team hotel to the bus ("Every other NFC East team has a backup quarterback. What’s your excuse?
2-4, Schotty!" the fan screamed, according to The Athletic), the Cowboys didn’t shake the battered Eagles off until the fourth quarter. They were even trailing late in the third, before Prescott engineered three late scoring drives, and linebacker DeMarvion Overshown thwarted the Eagles’ last real scoring chance with an interception with 7:55 to go. That was all great for the Cowboys, except for the fact that they struggled against an Eagles team that was playing its backup quarterback (Tanner McKee), without their two best receivers (DeVonta Smith, Dontayvion Wicks), and finished the game with their sixth-string running back (Elijah Mitchell) after Saquon Barkley and Dameon Pierce got hurt.
The truth is, it was embarrassing that it took the Cowboys that long to shake them, even on a night when their offense was finally humming again. The 38 points they scored were the most the Eagles have allowed in the 2.5 years that Vic Fangio has been their defensive coordinator. And running back Javonte Williams tore through a tough Eagles front for 155 yards.
But the Dallas defense that has been like an anchor trying to drag them under all season long was the usual disaster. They’re lucky Barkley injured his back, along with his already injured hamstring, after touching the ball three times, gaining 49 yards, and scoring a touchdown on the Eagles’ first four plays. Dallas didn’t offer a ton of resistance to the rest of Philadelphia's decimated offense, which used two more long touchdown drives to build a 21-20 third-quarter lead.
Yes, the Cowboys survived. And in doing so, they probably showed they’re the only team capable of making a run at the division-leading Giants (4-2-1) — a team with the best coach in the division in John Harbaugh, but one without its starting quarterback (Jaxson Dart) and best defensive player (Brian Burns). But once again, the Cowboys failed to answer their biggest question: Why, with a team this talented, with so many highly-paid players, does everything continue to be so hard?
That’s the question that dogged Schottenheimer heading into what his quarterback had called a "must-win" game. The previous two weeks had been particularly ugly. In back-to-back losses to the then-winless Buccaneers and the Packers, even Schottenheimer’s offense struggled, scoring just 29 points in the two games.
Schottenheimer's defensive coordinator, Christian Parker, was already under siege from fans and the media. The Cowboys had even brought in veteran defensive coach Mike Pettine a few weeks ago to help the rookie coordinator out. But now Schottenheimer was taking heat for the way he called the games for his star-studded offense.
And really, if the Cowboys don’t have an offense to continually bail out their defense, then they have nothing at all. And that possibility was embarrassing for a coach who has said he considers himself an "elite" play-caller, and who has more than enough weapons at his disposal to ensure the Cowboys are one of the highest-scoring teams in the league. So Schottenheimer had to be thrilled with his team’s offensive explosion Monday night, even if he wasn’t willing to show it.
Schottenheimer did concede that his offense was "pretty good," but wouldn’t say much more than that. He admitted the win was "really important" and "gets us right back in the hunt," but his demeanor told a different story. There were no smiles, no joy, no outward expressions of confidence.
And even though Schottenheimer insisted that the win "had nothing to do with desperation," it sure seemed like more of a relief. Prescott, though, saw it as something else: Anger over the Cowboys’ two-game losing streak, a renewed focus, and a "hunger" to get his team to start digging out of their hole. "I know the team feels it," Prescott said.
"It’s contagious. And at the end of the day, he’s our head coach. We’re going to follow him.
We’ve got his back and we appreciate that." Maybe that’s what the Cowboys need as they head into a soft spot in their schedule — four games against losing teams (the Cardinals, Colts, Titans and Eagles) sandwiched around a home game against the San Francisco 49ers. There is a real chance for them to head into December with a 7-5 record, which could be enough to give the Cowboys control of the division by the time December begins. But that’s really the problem.
It might not take much. So there’s no excuse for it not to happen. These Cowboys are just too talented to waste this golden opportunity.
Schottenheimer is coaching with a stacked deck of cards, even though his team too often plays like the deck is stacked against them. Maybe that’s why, when Schottenheimer was asked about his dour mood after a necessary win over a shattered opponent, he deadpanned, "I’m great" without a hint that was actually true. Schottenheimer knows he won’t be "great" if this win doesn’t turn out to be the turning point his team has so desperately needed.
The Cowboys are the most talented team left in the crumbling NFC East. They have been waiting years for the Eagles to falter and clear a path to the division title. Schottenheimer can’t let them waste that opportunity.
If he does, he’ll have wasted his, too.
