Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer said he plans to review “everything” about his coaching staff after Dallas fell 24-16 at home to the previously winless Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Thursday night, a result that dropped the team to 2-3 and marked Schottenheimer’s 12th loss in his first 22 games. Owner Jerry Jones called the performance “extraordinarily disappointing” in his own comments after the game.
The loss came against a Buccaneers team that had not won a game this season, and it exposed problems on both sides of the ball for Dallas. Tampa Bay piled up 241 rushing yards, led by Bucky Irving’s 165 yards on 21 carries, while the Cowboys managed just 50 yards on the ground on only 13 carries out of 55 offensive plays.
Cowboys Staff Changes: Schottenheimer Signals Possible Shift
Asked about the direction of his coaching staff following the loss, Schottenheimer did not rule out changes. “I’m going to look at everything,” he said. “I’ll spend countless hours trying to figure it out and getting a chance to step back, look at these five games, and see what we need to improve.”
Schottenheimer did not name specific positions or assistants under review, and he gave no timeline for when any decisions might come. The comments follow a pattern from earlier in the season. After a loss to Baltimore, Schottenheimer told his team in a meeting that he had overcoached Dak Prescott late in that game, saying, “I make a lot of mistakes.
I’m certainly not perfect. … I hurt our chance to win that game, and I’ll be better,” according to ESPN.
Jerry Jones Responds To The Loss
Jones addressed the result in blunt terms. “Yeah, I think we evaluate everything, but at the end of the day, we’re five games in,” Jones said. “I am disappointed in the way we performed this evening as a football team, and that’s just going to be one part of the process.”
The Cowboys owner went further when describing his personal reaction. “Extraordinarily, extraordinarily disappointed,” Jones said, according to Yahoo Sports. “You really do need to get it done when it’s there to take.
They basically were very physical. I thought both their fronts, was really surprised at how well they ran the ball, how they ran it between the tackles. That was surprising.”
Jones also tied the loss to broader concerns about the team’s trajectory. “Boy, I’ve been so disappointed before with losses, but this was disappointing,” he said, per NFL.com. “And I’m disappointed because I see potential growth here.
And we need to have good experiences on an individual basis as well as a team. And this was not a good experience out here.”
How The Loss Unfolded
Tampa Bay broke the game open with 17 points in the third quarter to take a 24-10 lead, powered by its ground game and a performance from undrafted rookie quarterback Jalon Daniels, who finished 19 of 25 passing for 189 yards and a touchdown. A KaVontae Turpin fumble on a kickoff return also contributed to the Cowboys falling behind by 14 points.
Dallas tried to rally late. Dak Prescott connected with George Pickens on a touchdown pass that pulled the Cowboys within one possession with 5:26 remaining, and Javonte Williams added 45 yards and a touchdown on 12 carries. But Prescott threw an interception with 1:22 left on what became the Cowboys’ final drive, ending the comeback bid.
Schottenheimer called the result a missed opportunity. “Again, it comes down to this being the National Football League, and it’s going to come down to the fourth quarter,” he said. “And even with as poorly as we performed, we had a chance to still get back in and try to win the game, and we came up short.”
What’s Next
Dallas sits at 2-3 after five games, and both Schottenheimer and Jones indicated the coming days will involve film review and internal evaluation across the roster and staff. Neither offered specifics on what changes, if any, will follow or when the Cowboys will address the running game that allowed 241 yards to Tampa Bay while managing only 50 of its own. The team’s defensive struggles were already a point of scrutiny before Thursday’s loss, as detailed in a recent look at the Cowboys’ defense.
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