The Cowboys seemingly have no answers for how to salvage anything positive from their 2024 season. In dropping their fifth straight game 34-10 to the Houston Texans, they still managed to find new ways to be inept, starting before the opening kickoff when they couldn’t even get the stadium open without it turning into a near-catastrophe.
Several familiar bugaboos were back, with penalties, turnovers, injuries, poorly-executed trickery, and questionable game management decisions all factoring heavily into the outcome… and therefore showing up in this week’s recap of the good, the bad, and the ugly from the game. But that doesn’t even count the wacky stuff that no one’s ever seen before in an NFL game.
As usual, there were a scant few silver-lining moments for those who looked hard enough. Brandon Aubrey and KaVontae Turpin, for example, flashed individual highlights… although only one of them counted in the end.
Here’s a full reckoning of what went right, what went wrong, and what went off the rails. It’s the good, the bad, and the ugly from Week 11.
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Good: Getting a do-over on opening play
The pre-game self-destruction of the stadium should have served as something of an omen, because things almost came crashing down in a hurry for Dallas once the game actually kicked off. On the very first play from scrimmage, Texans wide receiver Nico Collins took a short pass and promptly left the building, racing 77 yards to the end zone. The Cowboys were trailing just 16 seconds into the game… until they weren’t anymore. Thank you, Laremy Tunsil. The Houston tackle, the most penalized man in the NFL this season, got flagged for being too far downfield, bringing the ball all the way back and giving the Dallas defense a chance to start the game a second time…
Bad: Defensive play after that do-over
Too bad they didn’t capitalize on the gift. Mazi Smith gave the Texans that five yards right back with a holding call on the very next snap, which only helped to kickstart the Texans offense. Five plays later, Joe Mixon blew through the heart of the Cowboys defense, going untouched on a 45-yard run to give Houston an only-slightly-belated one-touchdown lead. Another of the marquee running backs to change teams this past offseason (the Texans got him for just a seventh-round pick), Mixon finished the night with 109 yards and three scores on 20 carries.
Ugly: Another fake punt failure
Oops, they did it again. After a Week 9 fake punt in Atlanta failed miserably, the Cowboys special teams unit dialed it up again on their opening drive Monday. Bryan Anger actually connected on this throw, but Juanyeh Thomas got dropped five yards shy of the sticks to give Houston the ball, already in field goal territory and with a 7-0 lead. The play call prompted Dak Prescott to throw up his hands in disbelief as he watched from an upstairs box. Special teams coordinator Fassel said Monday that the players on the field checked to the fake themselves based on cues they’ve been coached to look for. Maybe so, but this one smacked of desperation.
Good: Defensive turns away Texans after fake punt
Somehow, turning the ball over to the Texans on the Dallas 33 didn’t end up costing the Cowboys as the defense stood tall and engineered an all-too-rare turnover. Rather than try a 48-yard field goal to extend their lead, the Texans opted to go for it on 4th-and-3. Trying to hook up with Collins once again, Houston quarterback C.J. Stroud instead found Cowboys safety Malik Hooker for an easy interception. It was just the Cowboys’ ninth takeaway of the season and helped keep things close for a little while longer Monday night.
Bad: Wiping away Aubrey’s bomb, then bombing
Putting up under 19 points per game (and averaging just 14 per outing over the current losing skid), the Cowboys are arguably in no position to be taking points off the board, regardless of the circumstances. Yet they elected to negate Brandon Aubrey’s latest long-distance sniper shot, a 64-yarder which oh-so-briefly turned the game into a one-score affair in the closing minutes of the third quarter. The thinking was to take the 15 free penalty yards, extend a good drive, and come away with seven instead of three. Except the Cowboys proceeded to put together a near-comical series of plays that included a fumbled snap, a pass that hit Texans safety Calen Bullock in the hands and should have been a 93-yard pick-six, a holding penalty on Luke Schoonmaker, and an off-target fourth-down pass attempt to newcomer Jonathan Mingo that failed and gave the ball back to the Texans inside their own 10. The result? Almost five minutes of possession wasted… and zero points. The Cowboys stayed locked at 10 all the way through the final gun.
Ugly: O-linemen trying to be ball carriers
When the book of the 2024 Cowboys story is finally- and mercifully- closed, perhaps no play will encapsulate the whole head-shaking ordeal more fully then this one. First-round draft pick Tyler Guyton (pressed into starting service this season before he was perhaps ready, thanks to the offseason departure of Tyron Smith), allowed defensive end Derek Barnett to slip in behind Cooper Rush and knock the ball out of his hands. Suddenly with no one to block, Guyton had the ball end up in his hands. And the 322-pound rookie decided to take off running with it through traffic. Safety Jalen Pitre punched the ball away from Guyton; Barnett scooped it up and returned it 28 yards for a touchdown. Yes, only the 2024 Cowboys could manage to lose two fumbles on the same play. The blooper-reel moment also marked back-to-back games in which a Cowboys offensive lineman tried to inexplicably recover a loose ball while on the run rather than simply fall on it.
Good: Turpin goes turbo mode
KaVontae Turpin has been one of the few bright spots for the team this season. Already a Pro Bowl-caliber return man, the speedster is also making his presence felt in the passing game as the third-highest-targeted wide receiver on the squad, behind only CeeDee Lamb and Jalen Tolbert. The thing with Turpin is, sooner or later, he’s always going to break one. And he did Monday night, turning a routine short pass into a 64-yard footrace and score. And Turpin hit the jets to do it, reaching a top speed of 22.36 miles per hour on his way to the end zone. According to Next Gen Stats, it was the fastest speed by a ball carrier across the entire league so far this season. ESPN’s Seth Walder points out it was only the second slant route Turpin has run this year; perhaps that play should go into heavier rotation.
Bad: Wave of injuries hits starters
The course of the Cowboys’ season has already been irrevocably altered by injuries to major playmakers: Dak Prescott, Micah Parsons, DeMarcus Lawrence, DaRon Bland, Brandin Cooks, Marshawn Kneeland, and Sam Williams, to name just a few. On a night they were also without Jourdan Lewis, the Week 11 contest added significantly to the ranks of players to now worry about moving forward. Tight end Jake Ferguson went down with a concussion in the first quarter, and safety Markquese Bell sustained a gruesome shoulder injury in the second. The O-line took a triple hit: Zack Martin left the game with an ankle injury, Tyler Smith suffered an ankle injury of his own, and Tyler Guyton took a blow to the shoulder that knocked him out of the game. With a short week leading into Week 12 and then just a couple days before the Thanksgiving Day game, all of the injuries suffered Monday night could end up looming even larger.
Ugly: Defense holds penalty party on 4th-quarter play
Things got chippy as the game wore on, with the intrastate rivalry bringing out bad blood between the two Texas squads. Nine penalties on each side ignited more than a few skirmishes, with the biggest fight occurring with about four minutes left to play. Cowboys linebacker Marist Liufau and Houston’s Laremy Tunsil tussled well away from a five-yard run play, and when several Texans jumped into the mix, a slew of Cowboys did the same. It was over quickly, with officials throwing five flags- each one for a different player. Liufau, DeMarvion Overshown, Mazi Smith, and Trevon Diggs all got flagged for unnecessary roughness on the same play, but it was all thankfully offset by Tunsil’s penalty for the same foul. In a frustrating game for a desperate Dallas team, emotions boiled over multiple times. It’s likely to keep happening as 2024 drags on.
