Packers counting out Cowboys in Wild Card Game didn’t age well
Even though the Dallas Cowboys went into Super Wild Card Weekend as 3-point favorites, it appears that many expected them to lose to the San Francisco 49ers. Whether it was the Cowboys’ inconsistency throughout the season or the fact that they were only able to beat subpar teams, many NFL fans had their doubts about Dallas.
It seems that Green Bay Packers head coach Matt LaFleur did, too.
On the Wednesday before Green Bay’s Divisional Round matchup with the Niners, LaFleur told Ryan Wood that he anticipated that San Francisco would be heading to Lambeau Field. Essentially, the head coach was taking a subtle jab at the Cowboys by saying he figured his team would be facing Kyle Shanahan’s squad.
He said that because of the “respect [they] have for” the 49ers, they already started preparing for that team in the bye week. But…I guess that extra week on prep just wasn’t enough?
Matt LaFleur says #Packers anticipated 49ers might be coming to Lambeau Field this week, so they started prep on them on bye last week. "That's just the respect we have for them."
— Ryan Wood (@ByRyanWood) January 19, 2022
Also lots of familiarity already: "There are certain things we know we want to do in every phase."
Packers head coach Matt LaFleur said he expected Niners instead of Cowboys, but still lost to San Francisco
LaFleur had to be very confident in order to start prepping for San Francisco. Why? Because if the Cowboys had won, the Packers would have played the Rams, and the coach never mentioned anything about prepping for LA. Whether it was his intent or not, the comments definitely came off as a diss to America’s Team.
To be fair, LaFleur was right. The Cowboys choked on their home turf and committed several errors that allowed the Niners to move on. But if you’re going to make a public statement about how you had an extra week to prepare for the opponent you thought you’d see, you would think you’d have a better game plan with that extra time.
It didn’t seem that way given the Packers’ heartbreaking 13-10 loss. Clearly, the extra week of prep didn’t do much for their special teams unit. Despite the fact that the 49ers struggled to score on offense, two key blocked kicks ended up making the difference. After Aaron Rodgers threw a beautiful 75-yard pass to Aaron Jones, Mason Crosby had a blocked field goal. Then, Corey Bojorquez had a punt blocked by Jordan Willis that was returned for a touchdown to tie the game 10-10. Without these errors, the Pack could’ve won by double digits.
In addition to the special teams errors, Rodgers was sacked five times. We aren’t here to tell you LaFleur was wrong in his statement. But it does feel slightly better to know that his Cowboys diss didn’t age very well.
