In the trenches: Both Cowboys lines look to keep the momentum going against Giants

Sep 24, 2022 - 10:00 PM

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The Dallas Cowboys will face the New York Giants on Monday night football with both the offensive line and defensive line looking to build on the momentum from their performance against the Cincinnati Bengals.

Joe Philbin and the offensive line showed improvement overall against the Bengals, most noticeably there were zero false starts and zero holding calls on the offensive line.

Going into this game against the Giants, the Cowboys will try to include Ezekiel Elliot and Tony Pollard more as the Giants have allowed 196 rushing yards so far by the run defense who are currently ranked 26th with a grade of 50.9 by Pro Football Focus.

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Kayvon Thibodeaux & Azeez Ojulari are currently questionable, however reports are stating they are getting closer to making their season debuts against the Cowboys. Leonard Williams is also questionable as he picked up an injury to his knee against the Carolina Panthers. It would be a boost for the Cowboys offense for any of these players not to be available on Monday. As of right now the Giants defense has a total of three sacks, none of which came from their defensive line.

In the passing game, the Cowboys are hoping guard Matt Farniok can improve in his performances as he gave up six QB pressures to the Bengals defensive line. In the coming weeks we are expecting Connor McGovern to return to guard, but that might change as we could potentially see Jason Peters play at left tackle and Tyler Smith moving back into guard instead.

The Dallas defensive line will battle the Giants offensive line that has helped running back Saquon Barkley to 236 rushing yards so far this season. The former Penn State stand out has looked good so far and he will be wanting to replicate the form of his his first two seasons in the NFL when he reached over 1,000 yards rushing.

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Micah Parsons missed Thursday practice with symptoms of a cold; head coach Mike McCarthy made comments yesterday stating “is battling a little bit of a cold, so we’re just going to be smart with him” and is hoping Parsons is good to go for Monday.

Defensive line coach Aden Durde will want to see his defensive line go forward and attack the Giants offensive lines pass protection as QB Daniel Jones has been sacked three times. For Parsons and DeMarcus Lawrence, they will need to be on the lookout for Jones when he decides to escape the pocket to run with the ball. Guard Mark Glowinski has allowed seven QB pressures, with Evan Neal allowing five and Andrew Thomas with four in the first two games of the season.

The Cowboys defense has a total of eight sacks so far, four coming from Parsons, two from Dorance Armstrong and one for Leighton Vander Esch and Dante Fowler Jr.