In the post-season, games tend to be closer, and the Cowboys have thrived in close games

It’s often said that it’s not how you start but how you finish, well that’s the perfect cliche for this Cowboys team that started rocky but made a roaring comeback. Seeing an opportunity in their division, the Cowboys’ mid-season decisions have paid off and they will now host a home playoff game as NFC East champions. It only took the Cowboys nine wins to lock up their third division title in five seasons with one game to spare.

It hasn’t always been beautiful, some of the time it’s been downright ugly, but this Cowboys team has the mental toughness to persevere. That grittiness comes from a team that has experienced adversity through 15 weeks of football.

The drama is primarily caused by an offense that has a flair for the theatrics. The Cowboys have won and lost games in every way possible including snatching a victory or two from the jaws of defeat. As we look to the playoff picture in the NFC, can their style of offense get it done and make a run?

That’s the money question, how do they compare to their playoff peers?

Let’s just rip the band-aid off and start on offense. If you look at the season totals for this Cowboys offense, they look like possibly the worst offense headed to the postseason but looks can be deceiving.

(Note: Table is ordered by division leaders & record prior to week 17, + denotes the division winners, * denotes teams who haven’t yet clinched playoff berth

There’s nothing new to learn here when looking at season totals because we all know that the Cowboys have been much improved since the halfway point. The highlights for this offense in their last eight games include:

• 201 - Passes completed by Dak Prescott, only Pat Mahomes and Andrew Luck have completed more out of playoff QB’s
• 72.6% - Prescott’s completion percentage is second only to Deshaun Watson of the Texans
• 100.2 - Prescott’s passer rating ranks fourth-best among quarterbacks currently in the playoffs
• 815 - Ezekiel Elliott leads NFL in rushing, what else is new?
• 392 - Zeke’s receiving yards are second only to Christian McCaffrey
• 1,207 - Zeke’s all-purpose yards within same timeline also leads the NFL
• 694 - Amari Cooper’s receiving yards since joining team ranks fourth among playoff receivers
• 14.46 - Cooper’s yards per target ranks second behind Colts WR T.Y. Hilton
• 6 - Cooper’s receiving touchdowns is just one short of Texans WR De’Andre Hopkins
• 49 - Amount of third-downs the Cowboys converted in last eight games, only four current playoff teams have attempted over 100, Dallas and Baltimore are tied for leagues best 46% on money downs
• 27 - Number of times the Cowboys have punted on the fourth-most offensive plays ran during that time (529), rank third behind Patriots, Ravens, and Rams

Now, before we get too carried away, the Cowboys offense still struggles in many key areas that they’ll look to improve. Sure, the Cowboys aren’t the cutting edge of high-powered offenses like the Chiefs, Rams, or Saints but they get it done their own way. Also, remember what happened to those three teams when they faced defenses like the Bears, Cowboys, and Seahawks. The most impressive quality about this Cowboys offense is their ability to thrive in pressure situations, no team has won more one-possession games than the Cowboys.

The Cowboys have nine wins this season and eight of them ended in a one-score advantage. Outside of one week six blowout of the Jaguars, the Cowboys average victory is by a margin on 5.4 points. Still, though it may seem like the Cowboys can’t put away opponents, some of these opponent’s scoring came much too late to matter.

• Cowboys led the Giants 20-3 until 1:32 left to play
• Cowboys led Falcons 19-9, Atlanta got first TD inside two-minute warning
• Cowboys led Redskins 31-13 at start of fourth quarter on Thanksgiving & Washington didn’t make it a one-score game until 1:13 left to play
• Cowboys led Saints 13-0 through first-half, Saints ten points all scored in third quarter, were scoreless in first, second, and fourth quarters
• Cowboys led Buccaneers 27-13 until 2:23 left to play, Tampa’s longest possession was a 17-play drive that spanned almost 10 minutes, it ended with zero points on a failed 4th-down attempt at the Cowboys seven-yard line.

After 15 weeks of Cowboys’ football, it’s understandable to not put much trust in the offense. Their numbers aren’t going to look great up against some of the better offenses in the NFL but they don’t need them too.

Because the Cowboys join the Ravens and Bears as one of the league’s best defenses, they just need their offense to capitalize on opportunities. This past week versus Tampa Bay was a perfect example of that. The Buccaneers out-performed Dallas in every offensive category but still lost by a touchdown. Why? It’s because Dak Prescott and company took care of the football and Jameis Winston didn’t. On top of that, the Cowboys made every Tampa Bay mistake count, translating to two touchdowns off turnovers.

The Dallas Cowboys offense is methodical but they are also battle-tested. They have one blowout victory. They also have two fourth-quarter comeback wins on top of four game-winning drives by Dak Prescott. If you can call it a “shootout” by today’s NFL standards, the Cowboys have been in two of them. They won both of them with nail-biting victory over the Lions and a thrilling overtime triumph over the Eagles. In those two games combined, the Cowboys margin of victory was 55-47, a one-score advantage, how fitting is that? In seven of the last 10 Super Bowls, the average margin of victory was 3.5 points. These Cowboys keep it close but more often than not, that’s the path to victory in the playoffs