Cowboys never knew what hit them

By Andy Targovnik  |   Monday, December 11, 2006  |  Comments( 10 )

Dallas Cowboys
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In front of a national television audience on Sunday night, the Dallas Cowboys came out all fired up against the New Orleans Saints.

And the game couldn't have started any better for the Cowboys. The Dallas defense shut down New Orleans on its opening possession, which included a sack by DeMarcus Ware on the Saints' third play from scrimmage.

If that abbreviated New Orleans opening drive fired up the crowd, then the 77-yard touchdown run by Julius Jones on the ensuing Dallas drive put them in an absolute frenzy.

At that point, it looked like the Cowboys were going to run the Saints right out of Texas Stadium, and take a strong hold on the No. 2 seed in the NFC.

But then, the Saints hit the Cowboys so hard, so decisively, and so fast, that all I could think of was a "Looney Tunes" cartoon I used to watch when I was a kid. The Road Runner once whizzed by Wile E. Coyote so rapidly, that he stripped him of his fur; and the poor coyote was just left standing there, stunned - not knowing what hit him. And that's how the Cowboys looked, from the head coach to the waterboy.

Everybody contributed to the 42-17 debacle.

Bill Parcells threw a challenge flag in the last two minutes of the first half, even though he knew - or at least should have known - that it would cost his team 15 yards.

On offense, Tony Romo proved he's human and didn't play well. The offensive line committed too many penalties. Terrell Owens dropped a multitude of balls, and Martin Gramatica butchered a 44-yard field goal.

But the offense wasn't half-bad compared to the defense. The Saints had a whopping 536 yards of offense, which is the most yardage that a Parcells-led team has ever surrendered in a regular-season game.

The Saints finally added insult to injury by recovering an onside kick, when they were already up, 35-17. If that didn't shellshock the Cowboys, then a 42-yard touchdown pass to Reggie Bush four plays later certainly did.

And like Wile E. Coyote, the Cowboys never knew what hit them.

But in retrospect, maybe they should have. It was a superior, faster and better prepared football team.

It goes to show you that in the NFL, the second you think you have it made, another team comes along and brings you back to earth. And the Cowboys were brought back - with quite a crash.

Now they have three more weeks to fix their ship and try to take off, again.

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