Can Tony Romo and Dallas Cowboys win the title this year? (Part II)
Continued from part I...
The 2011 season
The Dallas Cowboys and the New York Giants went neck-and-neck in the 2011 regular season, but it was the latter who qualified for the playoffs after defeating the former in the regular season finale.
Romo was brilliant throughout the season and his accuracy in particular was commendable. He played and started all 16 games of the regular season and was also injured towards the end.
In total, he completed 346 passes of 522 attempts for 4,184 yards. He had registered over 4,000 yards in a season two times before the 2011 season in which he also got 31 touchdowns while throwing only 10 interceptions. He received a quarterback rating of
102.5.
The Cowboys did not start the season well and faced defeat against the New York Jets in their first game of the season. The final score was 27-24.
Cowboys were able to register their first victory of the season after an overtime win against the San Francisco 49ers (27-24).
They defeated the Washington Redskins in the next game with the score of 18-16, but were unable to carry the streak forward as Detroit Lions defeated them in the next game (34-30).
The Cowboys lost another game as the New England Patriots outscored them (20-16). They won the game against the lowly St. Louis Rams (34-7), but were defeated in the next game by Philadelphia Eagles (34-7).
The Cowboys registered much better performance after the defeat against the Eagles as they won four games in a row.
They defeated Seattle Seahawks (23-13), Buffalo Bills (44-7), Washington Redskins (27-24 in overtime) and Miami Dolphins (20-19).
If the Cowboys had maintained their winning run they would have easily qualified for the playoffs as they had gained lead in the National Football Conference (NFC) East division.
However, they lost four of their last five games and the Giants, meanwhile, recovered from their slump to edge past the Cowboys.
Two of the four defeats came against the Giants and the Cowboys were left in awe to see the Giants reaching the playoffs instead of them.
After the Dolphins game, the Cowboys were defeated by Arizona Cardinals (19-13 in overtime) and then by Giants (37-34).
The Cowboys won the next game that was played against Tampa Bay Buccaneers (31-15) and lost the next against Eagles (20-7).
In a must-win situation, both Cowboys and Giants faced each other in the regular season finale and the latter easily defeated the Cowboys (31-14).
In all these games, Romo stayed brilliant. But what mattered was the Cowboys’ appearance in the playoffs, which did not happen.
To be continued...
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