Which Cowboy’s team NOT to win a Super Bowl was the best…?
by gee-roj on Jan 28, 2009 10:38 AM CST
Email
PrintAs Super Bowl XLIII approaches networks like ESPN and the NFL Network are loading the airwaves with Super Bowl highlights from the past. Way too often these highlights include Super Bowls X and XIII. I understand why as they were both great games and they both included the Steelers, one of this year’s participants; but hey, while they’re at it, why leave off Super Bowl XXX which also included the Steelers and Cowboys?
The Cowboys’ championships don’t have much excitement, just look at the scores from their Super Bowl wins; 24-3, 27-10, 52-17, 30-13, 27-17, (this last win being the closest margin of victory). Now don’t get me wrong as I’m not complaining; I like that the fact that when the Cowboys do win a Super Bowl they decide to dominate. Unfortunately, however, for the Cowboys, the NFL’s most memorable games in which they were involved were contests that they were on the losing end of. This got me to thinking; the Cowboys really do have a lot of great football teams that were close but not quite. Here is my Top Five List of the greatest Cowboys teams to unfortunately not win a championship.
5. The 1970 Cowboys, final record, (including the post season): 12-5. This team finished the regular season 10-4 and they were the masters of winning tight contests including playoff wins over the Lions 5-0 and the 49ers 17-10. Ironically this team finally lost a close one in the biggest game of them all, when Jim O’Brien split the uprights giving the Colts a last second victory of 16-13 in the Super Bowl.
4. The 1975 Cowboys, final record, (including the post season): 12-5. This team also finished the regular season 10-4 and actually won an NFL classic for a change when Roger Staubach hit Drew Pearson on a 50-yard Hail Mary to beat the Vikings, 17-14, in the divisional round of the playoffs. Then they rolled the Rams 37-7 to take the NFC crown before losing a heart breaking Super Bowl to the Steelers, 21-17. Those images of Lyn Swann making the impossible catch with Mark Washington draped all over him will haunt Cowboys fans forever.
3. The 1981 Cowboys, final record, (including the post season): 13-5. This was Danny White’s best shot at winning a Super Bowl and this was by far the best all around team he played on. They finished the regular season 12-4 and were playing their best defense of the year down the stretch. Over the last 6 games of the season, heading into the NFC championship, they held their opponents to an average of 9.17 points game; including a 38-0 stomping of the Bucs in the divisional round of the playoffs. Unfortunately, the Cowboys lost the most heart breaking loss in the history of sports, (for me anyway); 28-27 in the classic, “The Catch” game to the 49ers. That game was more than just a loss; it signified the passing of the torch of NFC supremacy from the Cowboys to the Niners; that is until they traded it back 11 years later. :)
2. The 1978 Cowboys, final record, (including the post season): 14-5. The defending champions that year, once again saw their season end in disappointment at the hands of the Pittsburgh Steelers, 35-31 in Super Bowl XIII. They did a more than admirable job of defending their title by getting back to the big game and they boasted the league’s number 1 offense and number 2 defense that year. The season climaxed with 28-0 walloping of the Rams in the NFC championship game and were it not for a dropped pass in the end zone, in the Super Bowl … who knows… sigh.
1. The 1994 Cowboys, final record, (including the post season): 13-5. The Cowboys headed into this season as the two-time defending champions and dreams of becoming the first team to ever win 3 consecutive Super Bowls. There was only one team they had to worry about heading into that season; the San Francisco 49ers. These two teams would dominate their way to a 3rd straight meeting in NFC title game and it was understood, at the time, that this game and not the Super Bowl was the real championship game that year. The Cowboys headed into the contest having won 9 games by double digits, including a 35-9 thumping of Brett Farves’ Packers in the divisional round of the playoffs. Unfortunately the Cowboys got off to a disastrous start as 3 turnovers led to 3 quick touchdowns for the Niners and in the blink of an eye the score was 21-0. The Cowboys would dominate the game the rest of the way, losing by a much more respectable score of 38-28. There was a blatant pass-interference by Deon Sanders on Michael Irvin that would have been called by any other ref on any other Sunday but in this game, was not. Had it been called, the Cowboys would have had the ball 1st and goal at the one. Undoubtedly, Emmitt would have punched it into the endzone and the score would have been trimmed to 35-38 with plenty of time to play. I still believe, to this day, that if Jimmy Johnson had not left, this team would have three-peated.
Another user-created commentary provided by a BTB reader.
50 comments
|
1 recs |
Do you like this story?
Comments
This is pretty obvious
the 94’ team is one of the top 2 teams in NFL history to not win a SB. (last year’s Pats is the other team)
""I really dig Hannibal. Hannibal had real guts. He rode elephants into Cartilage." -Tyson
That 94 team solidified my faith that the Cowboys always have a chance to make a comeback.
What a game. I’ve never shut my TV off in disgust since.
ROMOCOP!
by Aaron Novinger on Jan 28, 2009 7:53 PM CST up reply actions
+1
"Ask Philly was it hard tryin' a stop TO, he da main reason that the fans would come fo'."
by aussie_cowboy on Jan 29, 2009 1:16 AM CST up reply actions
i'd say the 94 team
the first switzer year, we almost threepeated
but we won it the next year so i guess its okay
"Aw Shucks" - Wade Phillips
1994
I still get ticked of when I think of that game.
Lifetime Cowboys Fan from the Swamps of Jersey
94 was the best team
If they hadn’t spotted SF a 21 point lead in the NFC championship, they could have won that, obliterated the Chargers in the SB, and been the only team to win 4 SB’s in a row. A record that would never have been eclipsed.
T-New, shutting down WR's for Dallas since 2003
maybe
Just because we won three wouldnt have meant we would follow that with a fourth.
"Ask Philly was it hard tryin' a stop TO, he da main reason that the fans would come fo'."
by aussie_cowboy on Jan 29, 2009 1:17 AM CST up reply actions
Wasn't SF up by 21 by midway through the 1st quarter?
The Cowboys came roaring back and had a chance at the end. That game still eats at me
Lifetime Cowboys Fan from the Swamps of Jersey
I like the 94 team too but
I’m also partial to the 1981 team, it was the first year I ever really followed football…Dorsett with his breakout season, the undrafted Everson Walls leading the NFL with 11 ints and the team snagging 37 total, Ron Springs having a great all-purpose year, two receivers averaging over 20 yards a catch (Hill and Johnson), Danny White had a solid year and you had Randy White, Too Tall and Harvey Martin at their peak.
Also beat the Redskins twice and had clutch wins against the Dolphins and Bills. But what I remember most fondly is being two games behind the Eagles after seven games in the NFC East, but then ending up winning the division handily.
If only Eric Wright didn’t horsecaller Drew Pearson…
1981 was our year. we would have stomped the bengals. what a heartbreaker that loss to the 49ers was. sure, the ‘boys had just given up the go ahead score – the dwight clark catch we’ve had to look at for 20 plus years now. but after that the boys were driving on the niners, in their territory, needing only a fg, to win the game. one, maybe two more completions would have got them into range. and then white got sacked, fumbled and the game was over.
i carried that one around for a long long time. until harper caught the crossing route over the middle in the 1992 championship, actually.
by billstickers on Jan 29, 2009 10:24 PM CST up reply actions
it was a post route actually
lol and i can only recall the exact route because a few days ago i was watching the 92 America’s Game and Troy and Irvin described this exact play
Its been a long time since an nfc championship….
"Aw Shucks" - Wade Phillips
In fact...
White wasn’t sacked on that play, if I remember correctly, but rather he fumbled the snap.
0 = The number of Super Bowls the Eagles have won.
not correct
white was stripped from behind.
by billstickers on Jan 30, 2009 4:53 PM CST up reply actions
Yeah you're right...
I stand corrected. I just saw the replay of that the other day on youtube. It still hurt to see. :(
0 = The number of Super Bowls the Eagles have won.
In the first 12 weeks of the season
"Ask Philly was it hard tryin' a stop TO, he da main reason that the fans would come fo'."
by aussie_cowboy on Jan 29, 2009 1:17 AM CST up reply actions
How many former All-Pro/Pro Bowl mercs were on that '94 9ers team?
Talk about buying a title. Let’s see, off the top of my head….
Ken Norton. Boo. Bad Jerry for not giving this guy the new deal he deserved.
Richard Dent.
Rickey Jackson.
Toi Cook. (I don’t think he was ever a Pro Bowler; just a solid addition.)
And of course, Flourescent Deion.
My least favorite 9ers merc, though, was that showoff pigfuquer Gary Plummer who doesn’t even deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as the rest of the 9ers mercs. Plummer is the pigfuquing show-off sack of sad you may remember “taking the monkey off Steve Young’s back” on the Super Bowl 29 Highlights show. I also remember hearing this punk had “F**K THE COWBOYS” t-shirts printed up like the rivalry was serious business to him even though he was just some merc jagoff along for the ride.
wasn't the de/lb who played most of his career with the Packers on that team? I cannot remember his name
Lifetime Cowboys Fan from the Swamps of Jersey
Tim Harris?
(Romo) still gets excited when he buys a new t-shirt at Target for crying out loud
by I_miss_Switzer on Jan 29, 2009 5:57 PM CST up reply actions
Yeah
Charles Haley peed in his car.
George Teague, Brock Marion, the Roy Williams-of-old: Where are you?
by Aaron Novinger on Jan 31, 2009 1:26 PM CST up reply actions
Your #5, the 1970 squad
Was my first big taste of defeat in a huge game. After barely survivng the Detroit 5-0 win I thought we were destined to win it all. I was also thrown out of the house briefly by my mother cuz I was having a small tantrum. She never understood football.
As an underdog,
I liked the team that made the playoffs in Parcells’ rookie year in Dallas. Zimmer’s defense, a clean(perhaps) Quincy Carter, and an overachieving loss to Carolina in the playoffs really got my hopes high for the team’s future.
Guess I really did not expect the playoffs that year. I look at that year as the turning point from the teams of the 90’s.
ROMOCOP!
94
And the team would have 4-peated…or quad-peated or…ugh, you know what I mean!
At the same time, last year’s roster compared very well with that 94 group.
"Well, we didn't block real good but we made up for it by not tackling."
- John McKay, the first coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Why isn't the '68 team on this list
People get upset about last year’s team going 13-3 and then one and out. That team set the standard:
— It was 1st in the NFL, averaging 30.2 points a game, still a Cowboys record;
— it was 2nd to the Colts, who were considered “the greatest defense ever” until
the Jets beat them in the Super Bowl.
That D was first in rushing defense. It put up 52 sacks in a 14 game season,
And it lost in the divisional round to a team it routed 28-7 earlier that year because Don Meredith threw completed three passes to Cowboys and three to Browns that day. One was returned for a TD and broke open a tied game.
That team should have played the Colts in a classic NFL Championship game for the right to meet Joe Namath.
If you’re talking about the Cowboys team that did the least with the most, this one goes right at the top, IMO.
The point of this list…
…was to catalog some of the great Cowboy’s teams that almost won championships. I wanted to list teams that played great football all the way to the end of their respected seasons but fell just a little short. I purposely left off any team that did not at least get to the conference title game. An argument could be made that the ’67 Cowboys belong on here having lost the heart breaking "Ice Bowl," but alas I felt like a team with 6 loses was just not worthy of cracking the top 5.
You bring up an interesting idea though. Another list could easily be made of Cowboys’ teams that did the least with the most. I’m sure all of us would want to add the 2007 squad to that list and I would certainly place the 83 Cowboys on there as well. The 83 team opened up 7-0 and after fourteen games were 12-2. They went on to lose 3 straight games; 31-10 (to the Redskins who were also 12-2 at the time), 42-17 (to the 49ers who were fighting for a playoff spot), and then 24-17 to the Rams, (a huge upset in the Wild Card round). I’ve never seen a season with so much promise fall apart so quickly.
It just goes to show how great this organization has been over the past 40+ years. We have all these great teams to talk about and for the moment remain in a three-way tie for the most Vinces, (although there is a good chance that will change this Sunday). Imagine if we were all Lions fans; what would we talk about?
0 = The number of Super Bowls the Eagles have won.
I watched that '83 team
and it was not as good as the ’68 or the ’07 teams. Those were capable of winning Super
Bowls. The ’83 squad was old and their record was a matter of Tom getting the absolute
maximum out of them. They started 7-0 but were winning a lot of shootouts because their
defense was long in the tooth and could not dominate. And as you pointed out, they were
destroyed by the best teams in the conference, the Redskins and the 49ers.
by Rafael Vela on Jan 29, 2009 10:01 AM CST up reply actions
exactly Raf
The Cowboys defenses in the early ‘80s were old and not very good which is why Danny White shouldn’t get blamed for not winning a championship.
I’m quite certain neither Staubach or Aikman could have qb’d championships with those teams.
In Romo we Trust
Not exactly…
I described above how dominate the Dallas defense actually was in 1981. I agree that the defense on that team did eventually fall apart in the 80’s but in not 81; especially by season’s end. From the strike Look how many points they allowed in the six games leading up the classic at Candle Stick: 10, 9, 13, 10, 13, & 0. There was nothing old and not very good about that defense that year.
I do think that either Aikman or Staubach in their primes would have won that game at San Francisco. The Cowboys were marching and one or two more completions would have put them in field goal range. I’m telling you now that neither Aikman nor Staubach fumbles that snap like Danny White did. White just wasn’t as sharp when the pressure was really on. It’s not a knock on him because very few QB’s are but Staubach especially was supreme in those circumstances.
0 = The number of Super Bowls the Eagles have won.
White didn't give up that catch to Clark
and thats the play that lost the game, certainly not White’s fumble.
In Romo we Trust
That's funny
With Romo’s bobbled snap you said one can’t say one play cost a team the game. Interesting.
(Romo) still gets excited when he buys a new t-shirt at Target for crying out loud
by I_miss_Switzer on Jan 30, 2009 9:35 AM CST up reply actions
thats not what I said
I said that particular play didn’t decide the game, The Catch most certainly did decide the ’82 NFC Championship
In Romo we Trust
Didn't Dallas still have time to score
Just like if they had kicked the FG in Seattle?
(Romo) still gets excited when he buys a new t-shirt at Target for crying out loud
by I_miss_Switzer on Jan 30, 2009 12:48 PM CST up reply actions
But the game wasn't over,
White went on to fumble. You hold the defence to strict account, and pin it all on them. If the offence puts more points on the board earlier, the Catch may as well have been moot as well.
Of course, you still don’t think Romo did anything wrong in Seattle.
(Romo) still gets excited when he buys a new t-shirt at Target for crying out loud
by I_miss_Switzer on Jan 30, 2009 1:27 PM CST up reply actions
the defense lost the game, pure and simple
and anyone who watched the game realizes that. No way the offense can be held responsible for that game.
I never said Romo did nothing wrong in the Seattle game, just that the fumble wasn’t the reason we lost.
In Romo we Trust
What did he do wrong in the Seattle Game? Itemized list, please, if you have the time and inclination
Lifetime Cowboys Fan from the Swamps of Jersey
-1
"Ask Philly was it hard tryin' a stop TO, he da main reason that the fans would come fo'."
by aussie_cowboy on Jan 30, 2009 6:11 PM CST up reply actions
Don't forget Terry Glenn's weird safety causing fumble
and the idiotic playcall for a WR screen deep in enemy territory.
George Teague, Brock Marion, the Roy Williams-of-old: Where are you?
by Aaron Novinger on Jan 31, 2009 1:28 PM CST up reply actions
The 94 team
"Ask Philly was it hard tryin' a stop TO, he da main reason that the fans would come fo'."
Funny about the 94 team
almost every cowboys fan that I talk to, including myself, talks fondly about the NFC championship game, even though the boys lost. It really showed the heart and soul of the team. I’ll always remember Emmitt Smith standing on the sidelines with a device on his hamstring to message and loosen up the muscles so he could play. Everything fell apart early but they kept fighting back. Heck, I think I remember seeing an interview with Troy Aikman talking about that game and how memorable it was for him. Perhaps if the Cowboys didn’t win the Superbowl the next season, we wouldn’t be talking so fondly about that game. It’s all history now.
Aikman used a picture of that game
for his HOF induction. I think…
"Ask Philly was it hard tryin' a stop TO, he da main reason that the fans would come fo'."
by aussie_cowboy on Jan 30, 2009 12:06 AM CST up reply actions
Yeah if the boys hadn’t won the following year…
… that ’94 title game would have been much more painful to remember. It also doesn’t hurt that the ‘boys had beaten the 49ers in the title game the two times prior in ’92 & 93.
0 = The number of Super Bowls the Eagles have won.
Ice Bowl
Before my time, but the Packers would be much less annoying if they had lost, and there might be a few more Cowboys in the HoF. Bob Lilly said Kramer was offside, adn that is good enough for me.
(Romo) still gets excited when he buys a new t-shirt at Target for crying out loud
Nice post for debate
Some good options, but the ’94 squad has to be the best Cowboy team to not win a Super Bowl, almost by definition — pretty much the same roster as the team that had just won back-to-back titles.
Osa111 makes a good point too — I remember that game fondly b/c the Cowboys fought back so hard and damn near almost pulled it out.
Comments For This Post Are Closed
Secondary Sidebar
User Tools
FanPosts
Community blog posts and discussion.
Recommended FanPosts
Recent FanPosts
SBNation.com Recent Stories
In Association With
Shutdown Corner - NFL - Yahoo! Sports
- Alex Smith gets blown up by Jon Beason over Cam Newton comments
- Having finally landed, Kellen Winslow looks for a fresh start in Seattle
- Tim Tebow teased with chants of ‘Lolo!’ in Jets locker room
- The Shutdown Corner Podcast: Greg Cosell on the NFC South Draft
- BREAKING: Tim Tebow did not become a great quarterback today
