FRISCO, TX — Just when you thought you've figured out the Dallas Cowboys' offense, they **show you another trick hiding up their sleeve**. It's been the CeeDee Lamb show the past several weeks, he and Dak Prescott moving at an MVP pace together, and the New York Giants did their best to key in on him and Jake Ferguson, a breakout weapon at tight end.
For their troubles, they saw Brandin Cooks have a coming out party to the tune of 173 receiving yards and a touchdown, while still being unable to bottle up Lamb, who had a record-setting 151 yards with two TDs from scrimmage.
And Ferguson made them pay as well with a touchdown of his own, his third consecutive game with one.
"The energy is definitely high," said Ferguson on Wednesday. "It just goes back to our preparation and, I think, this stretch that we're in right now, we've just gotta take it one game at a time."
The young tight end is keen on tying up any … loose … ends going forward.
The next challenge presents itself as a bigger one than what the Giants fielded, with the Carolina Panthers disguising a good defense and sixth-ranked secondary behind a dismal 1-8 record.
They have a chance to present very real resistance to the Cowboys' offense — currently one of the most explosive units in the league. But considering neither they nor any other team in the NFL can double team any of the skill players for fear of either the others or them all having a big day at the behest of Prescott, it's truly a pick-your-poison scenario.
Prescott said "it'll be interesting" to see how opposing defenses approach this issue.
Ferguson agrees.
"I think [Dak] hit it spot on," the second-year tight end said. "When you've got guys everywhere who can play, it's gonna make it hard to double one guy, because you're leaving three or four other guys on one-on-one matchups. With all of the weapons we have, they're not just emerging — these weapons have been here. It's just starting to hit at the right time in the right spots.
"The word that comes to mind is 'dangerous', so I'm excited."
It's all a dream come true for Ferguson, quite literally.
"I still remember playing Madden with [Prescott and Lamb]," he said. "And now I'm like part of it, so it's pretty surreal for me. Sometimes I sit in the huddle and I'm like what the hell's going on, I'm a part of this."
The latter sentence is saying the very least, but have they hit their ceiling? Ferguson says no, because there's more meat on the bone.
"I think we're getting there," he said. "To where we wanna be."
Just an educated guess here, but where they wanna be is still playing in February and, at this pace of production on all sides of the ball — the offense finally matching serve with the defense and special teams — they have the best chance they've had in a while to achieve that goal.
That said, it is indeed one game at a time, and the Panthers await with eyes on shocking the world this coming Sunday.
