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“Just get away from it a little bit, get refreshed, recharged and get ready to get back to work,” Garrett said in a personal missive.
The Cowboys (9-4) have 10 days between the Bears game and Sunday’s crucial showdown against the Philadelphia Eagles (9-4) for first place in the NFC East.
And Murray did his part in following Garrett’s message on the Sunday off by handing out 50 bikes to kids at a charity event at the local Academy sporting goods store.
DeMarco Murray gives away bikes on his Sunday off - http://t.co/0WTJLiZk2R pic.twitter.com/Dgp94jHwJD
— FOX Sports NFL (@NFLonFOX) December 8, 2014
Speaking of bikes, the Cowboys have ridden Murray, the NFL’s leading rusher, like a silver and blue Huffy to their first winning season since 2009.
With three games to go and a division title within reach, they have no plans of changing now. Garrett said Murray has shown no signs of slowing down.
“DeMarco is a guy who has shown he can handle the workload, both as a runner and a receiver,” Garrett said. “He wants more. He never wants to come out of the game. At different times, we’ve done a good job of getting the other guys in there, and they’ve taken advantages of their opportunities, and we’ll continue to do that, but he’s a bell-cow player and it doesn’t look like he’s slowing down at all to me. He feels great. He says he feels great and really looks like he’s playing at a very high level.”
Murray, the only true bell-cow back in a league of running backs by committee, leads the NFL with 1,606 yards on 320 carries. Both are career highs.
The yards are 369 more than Pittsburgh’s Le’Veon Bell, who is second in the league in rushing. The carries are 41 more than second-place LeSean McCoy of the Eagles.
Murray is on pace to shatter Emmitt Smith’s single-season franchise rushing record of 1,773 yards set in 1995 and has a shot of reaching the magical 2,000-yard barrier. His 11 100-yard games this year have already tied Smith's franchise record.
Congrats @DeMarcoMurray on your 11th game with 100+ yds. Welcome to the club. pic.twitter.com/GnZinXS1qj
— Emmitt Smith (@EmmittSmith22) December 5, 2014
“It’s not about yards,” he said. “Whatever happens at the end of the year happens, but we’re taking it week by week, just trying to come up with some wins.”
The Cowboys are taking it week by week with Murray and focusing on doing with they need to do to win each game.
So for all the talk early in the season about finding ways to get other guys the ball and take the load off Murray, it’s notable that the Cowboys have actually featured him more as the season has gone on. Backups Joseph Randle and Lance Dunbar have five carries the past three games combined.
“I feel great,” Murray said. “I don’t take a lot of hard hits. I protect myself out there. The carries might be up, but I don’t get a lot of damage, so that’s good.”
For the most part, Murray and the Cowboys deliver the damage in the run game. His physical style of play goes hand in hand with the team’s massive offensive line, featuring three first-round picks in left tackle Tyron Smith, center Travis Frederick and guard Zack Martin.
Murray’s hard-charging ways give the Cowboys their identity on offense and is one reason the Cowboys like to stick with Murray rather than the finesse, jitterbug styles of the speedy Dunbar and Randle.
“He’s having an unbelievable year,” tight end Jason Witten said. “It’s tough to get the ball 40 times in Week 13 and do what he did. He’s a physical runner. I commend him on his effort. He’s a warrior. He does whatever he can for this team.”
The Cowboys were unable to exploit Murray and the physical run game in the 33-10 loss to the Eagles on Thanksgiving Day because they got behind so early.
Murray rushed for just 73 yards on 20 carries, marking just the second time all season he rushed for less than 100 yards.
The Cowboys plan to rectify that in the rematch Sunday by being physical up front and on the ground.
“You’re always striving to be a more physical football team,” Garrett said. “We didn’t run the ball as well as we had run it. It starts with that. At times we were physical, at other times we weren’t as physical in the matchups. I can show you 10 plays where we physically, technically, we were sound fundamentally. And I can show you a handful of plays where we weren’t those things. We always strive to do that, that’s our goal all the time. Being a physical football team is important to us. And we’ll do that this week.”
It’s that physical style that has been a key to the Cowboys' success on the road this season. They are 6-0 on the road and are the only team in the league unblemished away from home.
This is what the Cowboys had in mind when they changed offensive philosophies in the offseason from the pass-happy ways of past years to featuring Murray and the ground game.
The Cowboys wanted to get back to the physical, run-oriented style of football that proved to be the foundation of past title teams.
It was a style that was consistent, traveled well and wasn't affected by the cold-weather games in the crucial months of December and January.
“I think we’re probably built better than we’ve been in recent years to go play on the road in a lot of different adverse circumstances,” Garrett said. “We’re a more physical team on the offensive line, we’ve allocated resources to those positions, and when you can control the line of scrimmage and run the football, typically you can tend to play anywhere, regardless of the environment, whether it’s hostile crowd, or dealing with weather, or field conditions. If you can control the line of scrimmage, you give yourself a pretty good chance to win games.”
So it was no coincidence the Cowboys used Murray against the Bears more than they have all season when they got December started off right with the crucial win at Chicago last Thursday. He touched the ball on 17 of the first 24 plays and 22 of the first 30. He also had more touches in the first half (24) than the Bears ran plays (20).
Crazy. RT @ESPNStatsInfo: DeMarco Murray has more touches in the 1st half (24) than the Bears have run plays (20)
— Adam Caplan (@caplannfl) December 5, 2014
The Cowboys will continue to ride Murray and that physical style of play against the Eagles Sunday.
The Cowboys wouldn’t have it any other way.
“Like a lot of great backs, oftentimes they get better the more they touch the ball,” Garrett said. “He's a workhorse. He’s a hell of a player, and we’re lucky to have him.”
Clarence Hill covers the Cowboys for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. All quotations obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted.
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