Week 7 Preview: Cowboys vs. Vikings [Part One]

Looking to put Sunday’s loss to New England behind them and head into their bye week on a positive note and in control of the NFC East, the Cowboys take on Adrian Peterson and the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday.

The Minnesota game will be Dallas’ last home game until November 18th, when they take on Washington. In between now and then, there’s a bye week and two road games against division rivals Philadelphia and New York.

The Cowboys are coming off of their first loss of the season, a 48-27 loss that wasn’t as bad as the score indicates. Dallas led 24-21 in the third, but Tom Brady and New England put their foot down and outscored the Cowboys 27-3 to win the game comfortably.

As for the Vikings, they’re coming off of an impressive 34-31 road win at Chicago, in which Peterson ran for 224 yards and three touchdowns, and Ryan Longwell kicked a career-long 55-yard field goal to win it on the game’s final play.

Will Dallas forget Sunday and rebound with a win over Minnesota, or will the Vikings come in and pull off a surprise?

Last Time They Played…

Daunte Culpepper torched the Cowboys for five touchdown passes in the 2004 season opener as Dallas went down 35-17 at Minnesota.

The Cowboys actually had a 3-0 lead after the first quarter, on a 27-yard field goal by Billy Cundiff on the game‘s opening drive. But, the momentum turned when the Cowboys failed to score on a 19-play, 76-yard drive spanning the first and second quarters, that went to the Minnesota 6 before a botched field goal attempt left the Cowboys empty-handed. On the ensuing drive, Culpepper threw the first of his two second-quarter touchdown passes, a 63-yarder to Onterrio Smith to give Minnesota the lead, and on the next drive, connected with Marcus Robinson for a three-yard score.

Still, it was a pretty close game, as Vinny Testaverde and Terry Glenn hooked up for a 32-yard score five seconds before halftime to make it 14-10 going into the locker room.

The teams traded touchdowns early in the third quarter, as Culpepper threw a short touchdown pass to Randy Moss, and then Rashard Lee returned the kickoff 62 yards, then carried the ball all four plays of the ensuing drive, which ended with him getting into the end zone to make it 21-17.

But, the Vikings quickly struck back, and a second short touchdown pass to Moss made it 28-17, and Culpepper finished his day off with touchdown pass #5 in the fourth quarter.

Testaverde was 29 of 50 for 355 yards, but the Cowboys were pretty one-dimensional, as they picked up only 71 yards on the ground on 21 attempts.

Moss caught only four passes for 27 yards, but the two touchdown catches were big.

Dallas outgained Minnesota 422-415, and had more first downs (27-23), but along with the long drive that came up empty, they also fumbled deep in Minnesota territory in a drive in the fourth with the score still 28-17.

Series History

The Cowboys lead the all-time series 13-12. Five of those games have come in the playoffs, where Dallas has won four of the five matchups, including a victory in the 1977 NFC title game, and the unforgettable 1975 playoff game, where Roger Staubach’s touchdown pass to Drew Pearson in the final seconds gave Dallas a 17-14 win, and was the beginning of the famous ‘Hail Mary’ term.