6 major takeaways from the Cowboys’ thrashing of the Bears in Week 8
The Dallas Cowboys are now 6-2 going into the bye week, and they had a LOT to like on Sunday. After going into halftime with a 28-17 lead, the offense didn’t let up and took care of business against the Chicago Bears, 49-29.
It may be a bit of a surprise to see the defense allow as many points as they did, but it is certainly a relief to see the offense perform as well as they did. This 49-point effort is the most points they’ve scored since Week 18 against the Philadelphia Eagles last season.
Both teams combined for over 800 yards of total offense on the day, even though most expected this game to be a fairly low-scoring game, given how these offenses have performed to this point. Those are some quick takeaways. Here are six other things we learned from the Cowboys’ win over the Bears in Week 8.
6 takeaways from the Cowboys’ offensive clinic against the Bears
1. Penalties, penalties, and more penalties
This just seems to be an ongoing theme with this team, but penalties continue to be a huge issue, especially on the defensive side of the ball. Even just through the first half, the Cowboys had four penalties.
Offsides penalties, roughing the passer penalties, no matter what it is, they keep making undisciplined actions which keep leading to extended drives for opponents. For the defense, their worst enemy is themselves as they keep allowing teams to get back into games with unnecessary flags.
Cowboys CB Trevon Diggs' interception was negated because of roughing the passer penalty on DE Chauncey Golston. Next play: touchdown. Dallas needed four drives to score season-high 28 points and convert season-high six third downs. But Bears aren't going way. 28-14.
— Michael Gehlken (@GehlkenNFL) October 30, 2022
The penalties were mostly cleaned up in the second half, but they really can expose this team when they start getting out of control. It wasn’t necessarily the number of penalties that was an issue on Sunday, rather than the context of those penalties.
The team amassed six penalties for 41 yards against the Bears. It wasn’t the worst showing, but they still need to be cleaned up, as those allowed the Bears to extend drives, leading to points, and a much closer game than it should have been.