FRISCO, Texas — Few things went right for the Dallas Cowboys in their 44-30 loss to the Detroit Lions, and almost none of them for the offensive line. Dak Prescott was pressured a season-worst 20 times, hit 11 times and sacked on five separate occasions — under siege in a contest that also saw the offense unable to establish any sort of rushing attack.
Javonte Williams finished with 67 rushing yards on 17 attempts, averaging 3.9 yards per carry, and that simply aided the Lions' pass rush in doing what it did to Dallas' All-Pro quarterback.
In an exclusive talk with DallasCowboys.com, Cooper Beebe explained what went wrong in the Motor City, and why it can't happen again when the Minnesota Vikings arrive at AT&T Stadium.
"Yeah, obviously we didn't live up to our standard," said the Cowboys' starting center. "We [allowed] five sacks, a lot of QB hits, and it's obviously not what we wanted. We didn't go out there and perform the way we wanted to. I think the biggest thing, and we kind of talked about it, is we've gotta win on first down. We didn't run the ball very well, so it set us up for a lot of second-and-longs, which then turned into third-and-longs.
"… If we can't run the ball, teams aren't going to respect that. And I think that's the area we need to live in. We've got to be better on first down. That's the formula going into Minnesota."
But, considering the unit's dominance against Maxx Crosby and the Las Vegas Raiders, Jalen Carter and the Philadelphia Eagles and Chris Jones and the Kansas City Chiefs — en route to winning three games in a span of only 10 days, what exactly did go wrong in Detroit?
"We didn't have the kind of energy that we had been playing with in the last two games at home," Beebe said. "I felt like we just didn't have that kind of edge. We're still trying to find out why that was, but I think that was the biggest thing. I just didn't feel like we had that same fire, that same juice we had when playing the Eagles at home, and playing the Chiefs at home.
"We're trying to get that energy, that fire back heading into [the game against] Minnesota."
Joining Beebe in the exclusive Q&A was rookie first-round pick Tyler Booker, who echoed Beebe's assessment and hammered down on how unacceptable the overall performance from the usually stout offensive line truly was against the Lions, and how they can recover against the Vikings.
"It's really just about going back to our brand of football, and just being a lot better in the run game," Booker explained. "I think we ran for less than four yards per carry. I don't think we had any explosive runs, and that's just not who we are as an offensive line — not who we are as a team. We said that the team will go as far as we take it, so we just have to play a lot better.
"We can do that by staying ahead of the sticks and taking advantage of the opportunities that we have to run the ball, and stay ahead of sticks, be more efficient, run the ball, and not put ourselves in position where we have to drop back and pass, because we can't be naive to who we're going against.
"Those guys get paid, too."
Now sitting at 6-6-1 with only four games remaining in the regular season, the good news is the Cowboys did the unthinkable in finishing the first quadrant of post-bye games with a 3-1 record (including a historic comeback win over the Eagles and a victory over the Chiefs in a span of only four days).
The bad news is the one loss in that quadrant dwindles their playoff odds in a substantial way, to the point they'd need assistance from other teams even if they win out to finish with 10 wins on the season. But as Booker points out, placing focus on the other teams they need help from isn't going to do a damn thing for them against the Vikings, Chargers, Commanders and Giants, respectively.
"We just have to approach every game as if it's a one week season," said Booker. "Obviously, the playoffs are the goal, but we won't make the playoffs if we're looking ahead and are worried about everything else that everybody else has going on. Our playoffs are this Sunday against the Vikings. Every week is a one-week season, and we've just got to go win that game, so that's where all of our focus is.
"We can't control [what's already happened], but what we can control is how we perform this Sunday against the Vikings."
Controlling what they can control is all the Cowboys have at this point, and the offensive line will determine the direction of the remainder of the season.
