The Cowboys destroyed Tom Brady and the Buccaneers on a much anticipated Monday Night showdown. Winning 31-14, the Dallas Cowboys win their first playoff game since the 1992 NFC Championship Game against the 49ers. They would also win their first game against the Bucs since 1983 in the playoffs, and for the first time since 2018, they beat the Bucs.

Coming into this game, many Cowboy fans, including myself, were very doubtful of the Cowboy’s chances of beating the Buccaneers. There were a lot of problems with this team coming into the playoffs, but Dak Prescott and his team proved all the doubters wrong, crushing the Buccaneers and capturing his second playoff game win with the Cowboys.

The Game

At first, the Cowboys did not look so hot, with them going three and out on their first possession with zero yards of offense. The Cowboy’s defense would stop the Bucs with them going three and out with -2 yards of offense. The Cowboys would go three and out again, but would also cause the Bucs to go three and out. On their third drive, Dak would lead his Cowboys on a touchdown drive with a 22-yard touchdown pass to Dalton Schultz, however, Maher would miss the extra point.

Tampa Bay would drive to the DAL 5, but on 2nd down, Brady would throw an end zone interception with safety Jayron Kearse catching it. This would be Tom Brady’s first end zone interception since 2019, one stat that popped up was Brady had thrown 86 touchdowns with zero interceptions. The Cowboys would capitalize and get another touchdown, but Maher missed the extra point. Bucs would punt on their next drive, and the Cowboy’ dropped another touchdown again, but Maher missed the extra point. He became the first player ever to miss three or more extra points in an NFL playoff game, where he missed 5 extra points at the end of the game. At halftime, the Cowboys lead the Bucs 18-0.

Starting the second half, the Bucs would go three and out and punt, to which the Cowboys scored another touchdown, and Maher missed another extra point to go 24-0. The Bucs would punt on their next drive, and the Cowboys would also punt away their drive. Finally, Tom Brady and the Bucs found some offense and scored their first touchdown with 3:09 left in the 3rd quarter. Brady botched the 2-point attempt to make the score 24-6. The Cowboys returned the favor and scored another touchdown, and Maher would finally make an extra point in the game to make it 31-6. From there, the only action seen was a touchdown by the Bucs and a successful 2-point play to make the game finally score 31-14.

Stats

Dak Prescott ball out this game. He had 305 yards passing, on 25-33 accuracy (75.8%), with five touchdowns (4 passing, one rushing). Most surprising for many is that Dak and his offense did not record a single turnover all game long. Dak’s top receiver was Dalton Schultz, who had 95 yards on seven receptions with two touchdowns. Both CeeDee Lamb (68 yards receiving) and Micheal Gallup (46 yards receiving) would also record a touchdown reception. For their run game, Tony Pollard had a pretty solid game with 77 yards on 15 carries, and the team had 128 yards on the ground.

The Cowboys’ defense stepped up, making Tom Brady out of sync the whole game. They also destroyed any offensive effort Tom tried to make. Players like the great Micah Parsons would record a sack and two QB hits, while Trevon Diggs locked down the Bucs’ number #1 receiver Mike Evans.

On the Buc’s side of the ball, Tom Brady had 351 yards passing on 33-65 accuracy (53 %), with two touchdowns, one interception, and two sacks. His top receiver Chris Godwin had 85 yards receiving on ten receptions and no touchdowns. Mike Evans and Julio Jones would have 74 yards of receiving, with Jones having a touchdown. Their top running back Rashaad White finished the game with 41 yards on seven carries.

The Future

The Cowboy’s next opponent for the divisional round is the long-time rival, the 49ers, who Mr. Irreverent Brock Purdy leads. The 49ers are red hot and also are on an 11-game winning streak. Additionally, the 7th rounder from Iowa State Brock Purdy himself is on a six-game winning streak before Jimmy Garoppolo got hurt. The Cowboys will seek blood for last year’s embarrassing loss to the 49ers in the Wild Card round. Although the 49ers are packed with many weapons, they have shown weakness with Brock and have struggled in games. One of these was a too-close-for-comfort game against the Raiders in week 17 that went into overtime. Brock Purdy has been playing at a very elite level.

Still, he has never played a team as good as the Dallas Cowboys. Overall, the Cowboys will have a tough time stopping the running game of the 49ers. But if they can disrupt it enough to force Brock to throw more, they can limit their offense significantly. So if Dak plays at a high level, they can restrict the 49ers’ offense while establishing their run game. I will give them a good chance of beating them and making the conference championship for the first time since 1995. They will be playing on Sunday night at Levi Stadium in San Francisco, at 6:30 pm on FOX.