The ‘Boys are again on the town, coming residence to Dallas after a mini-bye week following their loss to the Lions on Thursday Evening Soccer. It’s one other prime time matchup, internet hosting the Vikings this week. Each groups are feeling determined, and neither can afford one other loss on the season, so this could make for an fascinating recreation. Nonetheless, our writers are feeling a contact of confidence.
When Minnesota has the ball
The Vikings offense has struggled fairly a bit this season. Final 12 months’s first spherical choose, J.J. McCarthy, lastly made his debut after his rookie season was marred by damage. However additional accidents and uneven performances from the de facto rookie have sophisticated issues for Minnesota.
They’re averaging simply 5.1 yards per go, twenty ninth within the league, and McCarthy has been erratic at occasions. However Minnesota can be averaging 4.6 yards per carry, Tenth-most within the league. Head coach and play-caller Kevin O’Connell has all the time had dependable operating video games, however this 12 months he’s needed to lean on it a bit greater than traditional. If the Cowboys can bottle up the run, they will power McCarthy into making some errors.
Defensive coordinator Brian Flores is among the greatest defensive minds in soccer, and he’s terrorized quarterbacks along with his blitz-heavy scheme. Minnesota leads the league in blitz price, doing most of their blitzing on first downs. Flores additionally regularly makes use of zone protection behind his blitzes, tying all of it along with closely disguised protection appears.
Nicely, Dak Prescott feasts on each. This season, he’s third in completion share, completion share over anticipated (CPOE), and complete passing yards in opposition to the blitz. Towards zone coverages, Prescott is hitting on 73.7% of his passes and averaging 7.4 yards per try. Whereas his most explosive performs this 12 months have sometimes come in opposition to man protection (hiya, George Pickens), he’s been distinctive at discovering open receivers and letting them create after the catch when going through zone. Prescott is a nightmare situation for Flores’ scheme, and he ought to give loads of YAC alternatives to Pickens, CeeDee Lamb, Jake Ferguson, and others.
Now onto the predictions out of your BTB writers…
By no means know which model of the Cowboys will present up, however right here’s a guess.
Dallas 30, Minnesota 21.
The Cowboys are outscoring the Vikings by a great distance. Cowboys are averaging 29 factors per recreation, the place the Vikings are approach down at simply 19 factors per recreation.
This all boils all the way down to the protection, and the Cowboys appeared to have regressed after sitting in Cowl 3 for the whole lot of the sport, which means the linebackers bought uncovered. Hopefully classes have been realized, and that’s quite a lot of hope proper now. However let’s keep optimistic and say the Cowboys excessive energy offense does sufficient to remain forward.
Cowboys 28, Vikings 24.
Whereas the Cowboys nonetheless face an especially uphill battle to make the playoffs, the Eagles loss on Monday evening saved the door open for at the very least one other week. Dallas wants this recreation, and. I see them popping out rested and motivated after their mini bye week.
Give me the Cowboys, 27-23.
It is a must-win recreation for each the Cowboys and Vikings to maintain their playoff hopes alive and I totally count on each groups to deal with it as such. Happily, I believe the entire benefits lie with the Cowboys. I imagine Dallas simply takes care of enterprise with the house area benefit.
Rating prediction: Cowboys 27, Vikings 13.
If CeeDee Lamb performs, the Cowboys have an excessive amount of firepower for the struggling Vikings offense to match.
Cowboys 27, Vikings 20.
I’m actually excited for this recreation, largely as a result of we’ve by no means seen Dak Prescott face a protection that had Brian Flores calling the performs. There are few defensive coaches as cerebral as Flores, however his tendencies – blitz rather a lot with disguised zone coverages – really feel like a horrible recreation plan for Prescott, who’s enjoying on the highest stage of any quarterback this 12 months.
I’m actually curious to observe the chess match between these two. I’ve a sneaking suspicion that Prescott (and Brian Schottenheimer) wins the battle, whereas the Dallas protection is more likely to play with a chip on their shoulder in opposition to a mistake-prone quarterback. This one might get out of hand early.
Cowboys win 41-17.
