The Cowboys did not leave their season opener with one clean explanation for a 28-20 loss to the Giants. They left with two.
Jerry Jones zeroed in on communication. Brian Schottenheimer, a year after Dallas finished with one of the worst defenses in franchise history, described what happened Sunday night as a humbling performance against a Giants team that was more physical at the line of scrimmage.
That split in emphasis matters because it frames the early question around Dallas: was the opener a fixable breakdown in alignment and communication, or a broader sign that the Cowboys were simply outplayed in the areas that usually decide September games?
Jones, speaking on 105.3 The Fan, said he was disappointed in the opener and surprised by the team’s lack of physicality.
“I was really surprised and dismayed, as all fans were, that we couldn’t basically stop some of that outside stuff,” Jones said.
He also pointed directly to the communication side of the loss.
“Communication aspects of it. Just being out of position. Fundamentally between the two, communication...”
Asked what bothered him more — the communication problems or New York’s ability to win more up front — Jones did not separate the issues cleanly. The Cowboys’ problems, in his view, were tied together.
Schottenheimer’s assessment was more blunt about the overall result.
“I thought overall we were really, as a football team, we were pretty poor,” he said.
He also acknowledged the Giants’ edge in physical play, a point that stood out against a Dallas team that had already spent the offseason trying to reset after a defense that had been among the franchise’s worst a year ago.
The Cowboys’ own numbers from the opener reflected how hard it was to establish anything on offense. Dallas managed only 69 rushing yards on 18 carries, a 3.8-yard average that left the running game without much room to settle in. Jones said that was part of what frustrated him.
“I was frustrated that we didn’t get more out of our running game which would’ve helped us more in our passing game,” Jones said.
The injuries only sharpened the early challenge. Schottenheimer said linebacker DeMarvion Overshown and safety Malik Hooker are set to miss a couple of weeks, leaving Dallas to adjust again before it even gets to the second game of the season.
Jones, though, did not sound ready to treat the opener as a verdict. He said he believes the Cowboys can play better than they did Sunday night, while also noting that the team has only a narrow window to make roster changes after the first game.
“We’re very optimistic that we can play better right now than what we played there Sunday night,” Jones said. “You temper that with availability of making moves on outside help for the roster.”
He also compared the amount of change around this team to the first year he bought the Cowboys, when they won one game.
“The last time that I was involved in as much change as we have made this year was the first year that I bought the Dallas Cowboys and we won one game…”
That is the backdrop for a week in which Dallas has to decide how much of the opener was a communication problem and how much was something more basic: being beaten at the point of attack, in the run game, and in the physical tone of the game itself.
Jones ended with the kind of question that usually follows a bad opener, but in this case sounded like the entire diagnosis.
“Okay, what’re we going to do about it?”