Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said Tuesday that no one inside the organization has an answer that will sit well with fans after Dallas let a winnable game slip away in the final seconds against the Baltimore Ravens.
Jones spoke on 105.3 The Fan two days after Baltimore’s 34-31 victory at Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. The loss dropped the Cowboys to 1-2. The Ravens improved to 2-1 in the first NFL regular-season game played in Rio and the league’s third contest in Brazil.
The game drew an announced crowd of 72,792 and swung back and forth before collapsing into a late-clock problem for Dallas. Jones said the Cowboys were in a strong position to win and that the staff is reviewing every part of what went wrong on the final series.
Dallas trailed 31-28 when Dak Prescott drove the offense into scoring range in the closing minute. A defensive pass-interference call on Ravens cornerback Nate Wiggins against CeeDee Lamb put the Cowboys at the Baltimore 2-yard line with 23 seconds remaining and a timeout still available.
An incomplete pass and a false start on tight end Luke Schoonmaker pushed Dallas back. Prescott then gained a short run to the 5-yard line, and the Cowboys used their last timeout. On the next play, Prescott threw the ball out of the end zone as George Pickens appeared to come open.
Prescott and head coach Brian Schottenheimer both said after the game that the throwaway was by design. Dallas kicked a 23-yard field goal by Brandon Aubrey with seven seconds left, tying the score at 31.
The ensuing kickoff went for a touchback. No time came off the clock, and Baltimore took over at its 35-yard line. Lamar Jackson hit Zay Flowers for 27 yards, called timeout with one second remaining, and kicker Tyler Loop made a 56-yard field goal as time expired.
ESPN Research said the sequence marked the latest start to a game-winning drive off a kickoff since 1978, including the playoffs. Ravens coach Jesse Minter said anything less than seven seconds would have made the play far harder to execute and that Baltimore might have simply run out the clock.
Jones did not try to dress up the finish.
“There’s no explanation that you’re satisfied with,” he said. “None. Let’s be sure that we all understand that. They don’t have one that they’re satisfied with. We made mistakes during that time, there’s no question about it. There’s no explanation. There’s an evaluation of how to not make the same mistakes again, which is what you should be doing. We can’t get that back. No way to get it back. What you can do is use it — if there’s any aspect of it that you want to just not even think happened. Any aspect of it, use it to get better.”
The numbers around the game only sharpened the sting. Prescott completed 25 of 40 passes for 276 yards and one touchdown. Jackson went 15 of 20 for 186 yards and two scores and added 50 rushing yards. Derrick Henry ran for 89 yards and two touchdowns. Flowers finished with five catches for 84 yards, including the decisive late reception.
Dallas had already stalled near the goal line earlier. Schottenheimer said after the game that he graded his own play-calling an F in those situations. The Cowboys also chose a touchback on the final kickoff after Aubrey had sent two earlier kickoffs out of bounds, a decision that left Baltimore with field position and just enough time.
Jones’ comments landed in the second season of Schottenheimer’s tenure as head coach. He did not say anyone’s job was in immediate danger. He did say the mistakes have to be evaluated so they are not repeated.
The Cowboys now face a compressed schedule. They had a roughly 10-hour flight home and little recovery time before playing at Houston, part of a three-games-in-11-days stretch that also includes a Thursday night game against Tampa Bay on Oct. 8.
For a team that spent the week talking about field conditions in Brazil, the lasting issue was not the grass. It was the last 23 seconds, a timeout, a designed throwaway, a short field goal, a touchback and a 56-yard kick that sent Dallas home at 1-2.
Jones made clear the film will be studied. He also made clear that no review will change the result.
