DETROIT — When you go to a Lions game at Ford Field, you’ll hear Detroit native Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” cranked up before kickoff to get the crowd going. There is a lyric in that song that encapsulates the Cowboys’ 44-30 road loss: “Snap back to reality, ope there goes gravity …”
“Back to reality.”
From the elation of three consecutive wins to the same self-inflicted wounds during costly losses throughout the first three months of the season — specifically giveaways (minus-3 in the turnover ratio), killer penalties, settling for FGs instead of TDs, big plays allowed by the defense, and missed tackles, to name a few. It felt like the pendulum had swung back to the miscues of previous months.
What is “reality” for the December version of these Cowboys? Is it the team that played well during the win streak heading into Detroit? Or is it a team that shoots itself in the foot and isn’t good enough to overcome mistakes, much less a talent-laden opponent?
Cowboys
Give credit where credit is due. With their postseason hopes hanging by a thread, the Lions were the more physical team on Thursday. They executed their playbook. They were the better tacklers. And they applied constant pressure, not only sacking Dak Prescott five times, but harassing him all night and disrupting the timing of the Cowboys’ offense.
And yet for all that had gone wrong for the Cowboys for most of the game, Dallas rallied in the fourth quarter to cut the Lions’ lead to three points. The “resilient” team we had seen over the previous three contests was energized on the sideline. Many of the players, and even some coaches, were lifting their arms in the “raise the roof” motion. Game on!
It felt for a moment like this could be similar to the rally in the comeback win over the Eagles.
Then the Cowboys kicked off and the Lions got a long return … and the buzz was gone.
Special teams is rarely the lead topic in a game recap, especially one in which a defense allows 44 points and an offense racks up tons of yards but cannot hit paydirt. But I’m starting with special teams because it affected the momentum of the game much more than other Cowboys games in recent memory.
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No so special: Here is an interesting (and troubling, from a Cowboys’ perspective) stat from Thursday night – 261 yards allowed. No, that is not the number of passing yards for Detroit. It is the number of yards allowed on kickoff returns.
Yes, Brandon Aubrey was 5-for-5 on field goals and Bryan Anger’s lone punt was skyrocketed 62 yards. Heck, there was even a blocked field goal courtesy of Sam Williams. But the Cowboys lost the special teams battle with the Lions because of porous coverage on kickoffs as well as costly penalties on the return units.
When the Cowboys offense scored a TD or FG to draw within striking distance, the coverage unit would surrender a long return on the ensuing kickoff to not only give the Lions great field position, but to suck the air out of newfound energy on the sideline, thereby killing the team’s all-too-fleeting momentum.
In the first quarter, after a Cowboys’ FG, the Lions returned a kickoff 40 yards to begin the drive at their own 47-yard line. Want another example? Fast forward to the fourth quarter after Ryan Flournoy’s 42-yard TD catch pulled the Cowboys to within three points, 30-27. The Lions returned the ensuing kickoff 38 yards to their own 41-yard line for another drive starting at or near midfield. Four plays later (including a James Houston roughing-the-passer penalty), Gibbs scored another rushing TD and the Lions increased their lead to 37-27.
Oh, did I mention the Lions were racking up the return yards with their backup return specialists? The starting returner, Khalif Raymond, missed the game due to an ankle injury.
The Cowboys’ return game continues to play average to below-average football, thanks in part to self-inflicted wounds.
KaVontae Turpin’s 42-yard kickoff return in the second quarter was negated by a holding penalty on Shemar James. Also, Turpin was flagged for the second time in three weeks for an Invalid Fair Catch Signal. But the Lions declined that penalty because Trikweze Bridges was called for holding on the same punt return, which meant the ball was spotted at the Cowboys’ 4-yard line, putting the offense in horrible field position.
You get the point.
On a night in which your kicker becomes the first player in NFL history to kick three FGs of 55-plus yards in a game, the conversation the next day on talk radio is the issue with special teams’ coverage and return units.
The Cowboys’ defense did not have a good game, surrendering an average of 7.1 yards per play. But they also got no help from their teammates due to poor coverage as well as three turnovers by Dallas’ offense.
Complementary football? Uhhh, no. Not on Thursday. During the three-game win streak, the Cowboys won two (if not all) of three phases of the game. In Detroit, they lost all three phases.
Appreciation for Gibbs: Wow, how awesome is Lions RB Jahmyr Gibbs? Boy, did he put on a show!
He is not just elusive, speedy, and exciting to watch, he’s a scoring machine and added three more TDs to his career total.
A three-year pro, Gibbs entered the game with 44 career TDs. That’s one more TD through the first three seasons than Emmitt Smith. Pretty good company, wouldn’t you say?
By the time the game ended, Gibbs had moved past three other Hall of Fame running backs (Gale Sayers, Earl Campbell and Eric Dickerson) who each tallied 46 TDs through their first three seasons.
And when all was said and done, Gibbs’ third TD of the evening tied Lions legend and Hall of Famer Barry Sanders’ all-time total of 47 TDs through three seasons. And Gibbs has four more games in 2025 to leave Sanders in the dust. By the way, Sanders was at Ford Field on Thursday on the Lions’ sideline during pregame.
Medical report: WR CeeDee Lamb entered the blue medical tent at the 12:42 mark of the third quarter following a play in the end zone in which the left side of his helmet hit the turf as he fell to the ground following an incomplete pass.
As team doctor Robert Fowler and the UNC (unaffiliated neurotrauma consultant) conducted a neurological exam in the tent, trainers and other team doctors were gathered around the video monitor behind the visitors’ bench to watch a slow-motion replay. Within a couple of minutes, CeeDee was headed to the locker room. His night was over, but not before he totaled a season-high 121 receiving yards on six catches.
Turpin was the only other Cowboys player to visit the tent during the game, having his shoulder checked out in the first quarter before returning to action.
Before CeeDee’s concussion, the most notable injury news was DE Jadeveon Clowney missing the game due to a hamstring injury. He was a game-night decision, going through a 20-minute pregame workout with director of rehabilitation Britt Brown to see if Clowney would be able to play. Isaiah Land was elevated from the practice squad to add depth at DE in case Clowney was a no-go.
As for the Lions, their victory is all the more impressive considering the number of injured players who missed all or parts of the game, especially in the secondary.
Both starting safeties, Thomas Harper (concussion) and Brian Branch (torn Achilles) were hurt during the game. Kerby Joseph was ruled “out” earlier in the week, so the Lions played part of the game without their top three safeties. Starting CB Terrion Arnold missed the game due to a shoulder injury. Yet the Cowboys offense was unable to exploit an injury-ravaged defensive backfield.
Familiar foe: Three of the Lions’ five sacks were tallied by a player who was not allowed to hit Dak Prescott last summer because he was in Cowboys’ training camp and Dak was his teammate. That’s right, No. 96 Al-Quadin Muhammad, who was a one-man wrecking crew in this game, was a Cowboy for 28 days during training camp 2023. He was signed early in camp that summer, then released in the final roster cut. He lasted eight days as a free agent before the Lions signed him to their practice squad and, a month later, to their active roster.
Super-loud crowd: Kudos to Lions’ fans who kept the energy (and the decibel level) high throughout the evening. The sellout crowd of 64,028 included fans who paid $185 and up for standing room only tickets, per Stubhub.com. Upper deck seats on the resale market were $250-plus for the top rows in the corner of the end zones.
The video board showed a decibel meter when the Lions defense was on the field, exhorting the crowd to crank up the volume. The levels reached the equivalent of power saws and jackhammers (110 dBs), snowmobiles (115 dBs) and tickled the edge of an ambulance siren (120 dBs).
To put those levels in perspective, a hairdryer or vacuum is approximately 70 dBs.
According to Pulsar Instruments, the maximum exposure time during an 8-hour work shift to noise levels of 115 dBs is 28 seconds.
OK, I wasn’t running a stop watch, but we went well beyond 28 seconds in the first quarter alone. No wonder my ears are still ringing!!!
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Motown halftime: Motown legends The Temptations, including 84-year-old original member Otis Williams, performed three of their all-time greatest hits at halftime: “Get Ready,, “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” and “My Girl.”
What a thrill to hear those songs in person! Earlier in the day, I visited the Motown Museum and the final part of the tour is the actual studio where the likes of The Temptations, Marvin Gaye, The Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson, and so many iconic artists recorded their smash hits. The tour guide teaches you “The Temptation Walk” (dance move) and you are asked to sing “My Girl” before you leave the studio. So, I felt very well prepared for singing and dancing along to the halftime show.
We were lucky to be there Thursday night because it was the first time the Temptations ever performed at a Lions game. It was really, really cool to hear 65,000 people singing “My Girl”. Nobody headed to the concession stands at halftime as everyone stayed put and sang along.
Final thought: Thank you to Mr. Astro (or whoever designed the Astrodome) for creating indoor football. Why? Because it was 18 degrees in downtown Detroit when the game kicked off, and felt even colder with the wind chill. But we were toasty warm inside Ford Field where the official temperature was 70 degrees (yes, the league really list temps on stat sheets for indoor games).
When the team charter arrived in Detroit on Wednesday evening about 5:25 p.m., it was snowing and windy. Thursday was sunny but cold with a high temp of 25.
And for those of you who say cold and snow is “real football weather,” I agree … but only when watching other teams on television.
Kristi Scales is the sideline reporter for the Dallas Cowboys Radio Network. She writes this column for The Dallas Morning News after each Cowboys game.
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