One of the hottest teams in the National Football League, the 4-1 Dallas Cowboys will look to push their winning streak to five games when they travel to New England to face the Patriots Sunday. The Patriots enter the week with a 2-3 record and an 0-3 record at home.
The Cowboys entered this season with high expectations and they have arguably exceeded those expectations. After a very close road loss to Tampa Bay to open the season, Dallas has been one of the hottest teams in the league, winning each of their four games since.
Not only has Dallas won each of their last four games, but they have done so in style. After beating a tough Chargers team on the road, Dallas has dominated their last three opponents.
They beat the Philadelphia Eagles 41-21 on the national stage that is Monday Night Football. They answered back by beating an undefeated Carolina Panthers team 36-28, though they led by double-digits until the final few minutes of the game.
Dallas kept things going with a 44-20 blowout win over the New York Giants this past week, going here consecutive games in which they essentially had the win before the final quarter even started. The Cowboys, who are a 3.5-point favorite, will look to continue that trend this week, in their first road game in almost a month.
New England has been a very unpredictable team this season. The 2-3 Patriots, led by rookie quarterback Mac Jones, opened their season with a 17-16 loss to the Miami Dolphins, before blowing out a 1-4 Jets team 25-6.
Since then they lost 28-13 at home to the New Orleans Saints, before almost beating the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, losing 19-17 in heartbreaking fashion.
Last week, desperately needing a win, New England hit the road again, this time to face the 1-3 Houston Texans. The Patriots entered the fourth quarter trailing 22-15, but tied things up before knocking down the game-winning field goal with just 15 seconds left in the game to pick up their second win of the season.
Dallas will look to control the game the same way they have in each of their four wins, with a balanced attack. The Cowboys will also look to continue to force takeaways with their defense.
New England’s rookie quarterback has gotten off to a decent start, completing 71% of his passes for 1,243 yards, but he has been turnover-prone. Jones has five touchdowns and five interceptions to start the season.
Dallas leads the league in interceptions this season with 10, and they will certainly be looking to add to that total against a turnover prone rookie quarterback. Jones’ five interceptions is tied for the sixth most in the league, and with just five touchdowns, only one quarterback in the entire league has as many interceptions and less touchdowns.
A win this week could be huge for the Cowboys, who are currently tied for second in the NFC, behind only the 5-0 Arizona Cardinals. Dallas could put themselves at 5-1 entering next week’s bye week, with a favorable schedule to follow.