Boy that was a brutal first half vs Detroit

[Yoshimitsu]

Maybe it was jitters and overexcitement because of the big home game? I remember Dez saying the message was to calm themselves down. I think they come out in GB more relaxed.

 

[Rockport]

Just rewatched the game (with a little less emotion ).

Amazing win but that first half 17-7 score could have easily been worse.

Romo had a very poor first half... Thankfully he was awful low instead of awful high.

The offensive line was as uncharacteristically bad.

Between bad tackling and bad angles, the defense looked very shaky.

Hopefully the team turns things around vs. GB or the Pack will hang one of those 35 point 1st-halves on the Cowboys.

Instead of focusing on the negative, why not focus on the positive?

 

[MichaelWinicki]

Instead of focusing on the negative, why not focus on the positive?

There were a myriad of threads started praising this team.

I wasn't unduly harsh nor was I trying to be... I was just stating my observations of the first half– and no doubt many shared the same sentiments.

Hey, the Cowboys won and I, like you, are thrilled with it!

But at the same time I'm not going to "ostrich-out" and pretend that horrible first half didn't exist.

I don't play that.

 

[Rockport]

There were a myriad of threads started praising this team.

I wasn't unduly harsh nor was I trying to be... I was just stating my observations of the first half– and no doubt many shared the same sentiments.

Hey, the Cowboys won and I, like you, are thrilled with it!

But at the same time I'm not going to "ostrich-out" and pretend that horrible first half didn't exist.

I don't play that.

Who does?

 

[Doomsday101]

Maybe it was jitters and overexcitement because of the big home game? I remember Dez saying the message was to calm themselves down. I think they come out in GB more relaxed.

I agree, to me the Cowboys came into the game looking tight and I don't think that changed until T Williams long TD catch and run, after that guys started to loosen up and began playing better but I also give credit to Det that is a tough defensive front.

 

[CyberB0b]

Just rewatched the game (with a little less emotion ).

Amazing win but that first half 17-7 score could have easily been worse.

Romo had a very poor first half... Thankfully he was awful low instead of awful high.

The offensive line was as uncharacteristically bad.

Between bad tackling and bad angles, the defense looked very shaky.

Hopefully the team turns things around vs. GB or the Pack will hang one of those 35 point 1st-halves on the Cowboys.

Yeah, it was the tale of two halves. They really fought and hung in there.

 

[xwalker]

Just rewatched the game (with a little less emotion ).

Amazing win but that first half 17-7 score could have easily been worse.

Romo had a very poor first half... Thankfully he was awful low instead of awful high.

The offensive line was as uncharacteristically bad.

Between bad tackling and bad angles, the defense looked very shaky.

Hopefully the team turns things around vs. GB or the Pack will hang one of those 35 point 1st-halves on the Cowboys.

Yes, on offense the Cowboys obviously thought that the Lions would just rush 4. The Lions blitzed often and the Cowboys didn't have enough short routes in the middle of the field which forced Romo to hold the ball to long. They adjust the routes in the 2nd half.

 

[DFWJC]

Good game plan by their DC; and they already had a very dominant defense.

The good news is that we adjusted and prevailed!

I think I heard that it was the largest comeback win in Dallas Cowboy playoff history.
Not sure if that's true, but impressive nevertheless.

 

[jobberone]

Yes you do. Those couple of yards are of significant importance to the trench war. Each battle counts toward the final resolution of victory or defeat on the LOS. Obviously we want to avoid negative plays but they are much more likely to happen in passing situations, especially against the blitz. I like play action on first down and taking some shots to Dez, I don't like taking Murray out of the game on 2nd and 6 and going empty set shotgun or on 3rd and two. To be multi-dimensional the Cowboys must stay balanced 50% pass 50% run, IMO. That has made both our running game, our passing game and our defense play its best in 2014.

When we get one dimensional or unbalanced our offense gets ugly.

Ok.

 

[aikemirv]

On all but one of Romo's 3rd or 4th down attempts, the Cowboys were trailing in the game.

Over the course of the season, the average pass rating on 3rd and 9-10 when trailing in the game was 59.3, and the conversion percentage was 27.5%.

Against the 2014 Lions, it was 39.6 at 21.1%.

And Romo put up a 149.3 at 57.1% yesterday.

I think that has been Tony's signature since coming into the league. He has ALWAYS had good success in the third and long. It has been one of my favorite things about watching him. You are never out of a chance when he is the QB.

 

[LittleBoyBlue]

I agree . We start like that in gb and we are down 3-4 scores at half

And that will lead me to say from the movie horrible bosses... "Mother fudger jones"

That would suck... Big time suckage!!

 

[aikemirv]

There were a myriad of threads started praising this team.

I wasn't unduly harsh nor was I trying to be... I was just stating my observations of the first half– and no doubt many shared the same sentiments.

Hey, the Cowboys won and I, like you, are thrilled with it!

But at the same time I'm not going to "ostrich-out" and pretend that horrible first half didn't exist.

I don't play that.

I am with you there. It was rough and I never had a feeling that we were going to win that game. I thought it was just not our day when we missed the FG.

I love that we won it but it was a tough game to watch for the first 3 qtrs. Like Romo said in the presser, the first qtr reminded me of the playoff loss versus the Vikings when he got completely hammered. I wondered why the Oline could not protect in the playoffs after such a good season. The only time the OLINE looked that bad was against the Skins in the first game where they blitzed us a lot.

Blitz pickup is the key going forward with GB and Seattle. They are going to try to expose that. One thing that bothered me was the lack of screen passes to Dunbar or Randle. That has to be a bit more of the gameplan with there explosiveness IMO.

 

[hornitosmonster]

Resiliency, that is what the Cowboys demonstrated.

 

[LittleBoyBlue]

Maybe it was jitters and overexcitement because of the big home game? I remember Dez saying the message was to calm themselves down. I think they come out in GB more relaxed.

Nope.

We have done THAT a half a dozen times or so during season.

Unfortunately, that's what this team is at this point. Anything to the contrary is an anomaly.