With the Eagles favored by many analysts to return to the Super Bowl as the cream of the NFC crop and the Cowboys picked by most to finish near the bottom of the conference, it would have been easy to buy into the likely narrative that Philadelphia would wipe Dallas off the field in the shadow of their newly-hung championship banner.
The Cowboys, under new head coach Brian Schottenheimer, had other plans.
The night got off to a bizarre start when the Eagles lost two players before the first snap of the game. After the opening kickoff, fullback Ben VanSumeren not only went down with an apparent knee injury, but as trainers attended to him, defensive end Jalen Carter got himself ejected for spitting on Dak Prescott right in front of an official. It was a massive development that changed the tenor of the game before it had even started.
The Cowboys were quick to take advantage. With the Eagles’ former first-round draft pick safely in the tunnel, Dak Prescott spread the ball around nicely on the offense’s first series, ending the drive with a rushing touchdown, something that was in short supply last season. Javonte Williams showed patience and power, punching the ball into the end zone on the Cowboys’ first two possessions. (Dallas didn’t have a single game in 2024 with that many ground scores.)
Matt Eberflus’s defense looked suspect in their early chances to respond. Poor tackling, bad angles, and gaping holes all over the field allowed Jalen Hurts and the Eagles to march down the field to tie the score on their opening series… and then do it again on the second.
Kaiir Elam’s allowance of a 51-yard third-down Hurts-to-Jahan-Dotson pass pickup helped Philly take a 21-17 lead just before halftime. But thanks to some good clock management, Dallas was able to put themselves into position for a long field goal from Brandon Aubrey as the teams went to intermission, the 21-20 score closer than many might have expected.
The defense jelled to hold the Eagles to a long field goal to start the third quarter, and the Cowboys appeared poised to re-take the lead when Miles Sanders coughed up the ball inside the 10-yard-line. Lightning had struck… literally.
While the subsequent hourlong weather stoppage looked to potentially sap any momentum the takeaway might have given Hurts & Co., it also gave the Dallas defense a chance to regroup. A three-and-out forced the NFL season’s first punt.
The two teams traded stalled drives for most of the final quarter. But Prescott finally got the ball back for Dallas’s last chance: 82 yards to go, three minutes to play, three timeouts to use, down by four points. A near-interception an an uncharacteristic CeeDee Lamb drop took things to two minutes, and on fourth down, a diving Lamb was unable again to reel in a ball that floated just past his fingertips.
Looking to run out the clock, Hurts finally scrambled for a first down that sealed the game for Philadelphia.
There will be talk of moral victories and how there’s no such thing in the NFL, but the Cowboys hung in with the Super Bowl champs for 60 minutes and could have just as easily won this game. Given the tumultuous offseason and the drama of trading away their best player just seven days prior, that is something the team- and their fans- can definitely build on.
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This article originally appeared on Cowboys Wire: Cowboys come within spitting distance but fall to Eagles, 24-20
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