FOXBORO, Mass. — Sunday was not Jason Garrett’s finest showing, to say the least.
Garrett undoubtedly was outcoached by Bill Belichick, which just might have been the difference the Dallas Cowboys’ narrow loss to the New England Patriots at Gillette Stadium. Dallas had a chance to make a statement against the reigning Super Bowl champions, but the opportunity went by the waywise largely by self-infliction.
Case in point: a curious decision to kick a 29-yard field goal trailing 13-6 with six minutes to go in the fourth quarter. The Cowboys had struggled all day to get anything going offensively, and it, quite frankly, seemed unlikely they were going to find themselves deep in Patriots territory at any point in the remainder of the contest.
After the game, Garrett explained his decision to merely trim New England’s lead instead of going on the aggressive and pursuing a potential game-tying touchdown.
“Yeah, just to give us a chance coming back the other way, fourth-and-7,” Garrett said. “You know, make it a four-point game. They go ahead and kick a field goal coming back, you still have a chance to be in the game. We would get it back with just under three, with a chance to go win it. So just felt good about that decision, at that time.”
Garrett continued: “Obviously it didn’t work out for us, unfortunately. So, I played it out and we had a great opportunity to go win the ballgame at the end. You know, in that situation, if they bleed the clock to end the game you don’t get it back again. You know, that’s one scenario. But when you get a chance to get the ball back, to go win the ballgame, you just want to give yourself that opportunity.”
Yeah, we can’t imagine franchise owner Jerry Jones was overly thrilled with this decision.
