New week, same result. Even with the Dallas Cowboys being eliminated from the postseason, the hope was that the team could find some positives in the last few weeks of the 2025 season. Unfortunately, that didn’t really happen on Sunday. The Cowboys suffered another crushing loss at home, and quarterback Dak Prescott watched the final few minutes from the sidelines.
Aside from pride, what else do the Cowboys have to play for? The Cowboys could win their next two games and at least claim that they didn’t have a losing season, should they end the year at 8-8-1. Regardless of them not competing for the postseason, losing stings. Here’s how the Los Angeles Chargers thunderstruck the Cowboys.
The pass rush goes missing
Where has the pressure gone? Last week, the Cowboys couldn’t lay a finger on Minnesota Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy. This week, it was more of the same thing against a much more potent passer in Justin Herbert. Mind you, Los Angeles’ offense is battered, playing with several backups and a third-string right tackle in Bobby Hart, who was relatively awful last week.
Whenever the Cowboys committed an extra defender on a blitz, Herbert escaped the pocket to find his receivers or green turf ahead of him. In one critical moment in the game, Kenneth Murray had a free rush at Herbert, but couldn’t bring him down, and Herbert scampered away for a 33-yard gain. Déjà vu once more, as for the second consecutive week, Dallas fails to sack the opposing quarterback. Five-man fronts, dropping seven in coverage, nothing has seemed to work over the last two games. With two games left in the season, and defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus coaching for his job, he has to fix a defense that can’t get to the quarterback.
Not containing Quentin Johnston
The Chargers have a lot of ways to beat you. Jim Harbaugh loves to establish the run and control the line of scrimmage, but he also has a great quarterback with weapons that can create explosive plays, and Quentin Johnston efficiently detonated on the Cowboys’ secondary. From the Chargers’ opening drive, he proved he was going to be a problem for Dallas. On Los Angeles’ first touchdown, he made a great one-handed grab to get the Chargers going.
He followed that up with a 50-yard bomb over the Cowboys’ secondary, then had a significant third-down grab over Trevon Diggs that allowed the Chargers to play keep-away and continue to drain the clock. Johnston had four receptions on five targets for 104 yards. When targeted, Herbert had a perfect 158.3 quarterback rating when throwing in his direction. The Cowboys allowed Johnston to be a one-man show to anchor the Chargers’ passing attack, and it cost them dearly.
Poor tackling in the secondary
Although the Cowboys’ front seven didn’t give the secondary many opportunities, the secondary was also very disappointing. Many players in the back half of the defense had some pretty rough outings, namely, Shavon Revel. He was defending in coverage on Johnston’s touchdown, and often Herbert would single him out to make a play on defense. He also missed a tackle in space that would have allowed the Cowboys to get a stop on third down when KeAndre Lambert-Smith broke free from him and picked up a first down to extend a drive for Los Angeles.
That particular series lasted 16 plays and almost took eight minutes off the clock, 11 more plays after Revel’s missed tackle. Later, with the Cowboys down by 10 and hoping to get the ball back trailing by no more than two scores, Reddy Steward has a chance to stop Omarion Hampton at the line of scrimmage to set up a 3rd-and-goal from the two-yard line. Instead, he didn’t wrap up Hampton, and Hampton trotted into the end zone to effectively end the game after handing Los Angeles a 17-point lead. Justin Herbert converted several third downs, and it was partly because the secondary couldn’t tackle in space.
Untimely penalties
This may go unnoticed, but the Cowboys had so many penalties that came at the worst possible time. You knew, given the way their defense had been performing, Dallas needed to score a touchdown whenever possible. Tyler Smith’s holding penalty on the Cowboys’ second possession wiped away a Ryan Flournoy touchdown, and Dallas had to settle for three points. Los Angeles would then score a touchdown on their next two possessions and carry a four-point lead into the half and receiving the opening kickoff. Those four points were the difference between a tie game at the break.
CeeDee Lamb also had a big-time penalty as the Cowboys were in a position to tie the game. After Prescott completed an 18-yard bullet to him, the Cowboys were at the Chargers’ 25-yard line. However, two plays later on 3rd-and-5, Lamb drew a false start penalty that pushed the Cowboys backward. This was a precursor to George Pickens being a yard short of the marker on a third-down completion, and then Leupke was stopped on fourth to turn the ball over back to the Chargers. With how the Cowboys were rolling at that point, 3rd-and-5 would have been a breeze for the offense.
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