Cowboys host Niners at Texas Stadium

Dallas heavy favorites over San Fran

Coming off their huge victory over the Redskins last week, the Cowboys (6-4) will host the 49ers (3-7) this Sunday at Texas Stadium. It was an important win for Dallas, one that may have saved their season, but an upset loss to the Niners would make it meaningless. However, the Cowboys are heavy favorites and should be able to beat San Francisco, a team that has struggled all season.

After the Redskins games many of the Dallas players expressed what a different team they are with Tony Romo at quarterback. Head coach, Wade Phillips, talked about what a difference Romo makes not only because of his ability but his leadership as well. Romo looked shaky at times in his first game since returning from a broken pinky that sidelined him for a month, but when the game was on the line he came up big, delivering the go ahead and game winning touchdown. The injury is still not a hundred percent healed as Romo will likely have it heavily wrapped for this week’s game, but as his pinky improves so will his play. At least the Cowboys are hoping he will improve as they will need better and consistent play out of their quarterback if they’re going to take care of business against the 49ers and beyond.

Dallas will be looking to have a breakout game on offense this week. Although they won against the Redskins they only scored 14 points, which is the same average they achieved without Romo. Prior to Romo’s injury they had been scoring nearly 30 points a game and they’ll be trying to move closer to that average against a lowly 49ers team. The Cowboys offense suffered a loss this week in receiving the news that rookie running back Felix Jones had to be placed on the injured reserve list and will not play again this season. But Cowboy fans can take heart in the fact that they still have Marion Barber who played much better with Romo under center. And of course there are plenty of other weapons on offense including Roy Williams, Jason Witten and most of all T.O. Dallas plans to get Owens much more involved than he has been in recent weeks, and with Romo starting that’s a real possibility.

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There was some good news during the week (or was it?) in that Adam Jones will be reinstated by the NFL and can return to action by early December. The return of Pacman Jones should provide a nice boost to the Dallas secondary, but in the meantime they should be pleased with the way their defense stood up against Washington. They played some really tough-nosed football and shut down the Redskins offensive attack. Terence Newman played well in his first game back from injury and had an interception at a key moment of the game. They’ll have to give the same effort against the 49ers with the focus likely to be on San Francisco’s running back Frank Gore, who has been coming on strong lately.

This is a good game for the Cowboys to have coming off their very physical contest against Washington. No team can be taken lightly in the NFL and sometimes it’s the losing teams that are most dangerous, but the 49ers are very beatable. Since the game is being played in Dallas it gives the Cowboys an even greater advantage and a tremendous opportunity to build off their victory from a week ago. The Cowboys would love nothing more than to blow the Niners out and maybe rest some of their guys late in the game in preparation of a short week. Dallas, as always, will be playing again only four days later on Thanksgiving Day when they’ll host the Seahawks.

By Steven Mondelli
ProFootball-fans.com Dallas Cowboys Correspondent