Cowboys Enjoy Victory & Other Notes

From Arrowhead Stadium

For a week at least, the Cowboys fans with the torches and pitch forks will not march on team headquarters in hopes of stringing up the head coach and the starting quarterback.

The 26-20 overtime victory over the winless Chiefs will not be celebrated as any great thing. In fact, by the time the pundits and fans debate this on Monday it will sound like the Cowboys lost the game.

Late Sunday afternoon, none of that mattered to head coach Wade Phillips, QB Tony Romo or the newest star with the star on his helmet, record-setting WR Miles Austin.

“We had a lot of guys come through and play big for us,” said Phillips of his now 3-2 team. “It took all of them in all different occasions to win and that is what we needed. Two games we lost, we needed one more play and this game we had it.”

Romo had a very nice game, completing 20 of 34 passes for 351 yards, two TDS, no interceptions and a 113.7 passer rating.

“I’m really proud of the guys; they kept battling out there,” said Romo. “I don’t know what is going to look like or how many penalties we had, but I don’t know if there’s a team that overcame some of the things that we had to overcome in one single game.”

In the highly competitive NFC East, it was very important for the Cowboys to get a victory against the Chiefs. The New York Giants beat up Oakland to go 5-0 on the season. Philadelphia got QB Donovan McNabb back and smacked Tampa Bay and the Eagles are now 3-1. The Cowboys head for their bye week now 3-2 and still close enough to make something happen over the final 11 games.

“We have a ways to go,” said Phillips. “This team is going to win more games because of what you saw today. They have a lot of heart and a lot of effort.”

AUSTIN POWERS THE COWBOYS VICTORY

It was the first start of Miles Austin’s NFL career and after catching 10 passes for 250 yards, it’s a good bet that he’ll get more chances to be on the field for the Cowboys or somebody else.

His performance was a single game receiving yardage record for the Cowboys, breaking the old mark of 246 yards set by Hall of Famer Bob Hayes back in 1966. His 250 yards was also the most receiving yards ever racked up against the Chiefs franchise in 50 seasons. The old mark was 245 yards by Houston Oilers WR Haywood Jeffries back in 1990.

“It’s a feeling that’s unbelievable,” Austin said. “I give all the credit to God and my teammates and my family. It was a great collective effort.”

Going into the game, Austin had just five catches for 81 yards in four games. Coming into this season, the New Jersey native had 18 catches for 354 yards in three seasons.

So yes, this was a breakout game for Austin.

“Miles is a guy who was in Dallas when I was and I’ve got to take my hat off to him,” said Chiefs head coach Todd Haley, who was an assistant coach on the Cowboys staff in 2006 when Austin was signed as a college free agent. “He’s been working, trying to find his way. He made a couple of huge plays, probably the biggest of his career.”

Austin came out of Monmouth University as the school’s all-time leading receiver. Of course, Monmouth doesn’t produce many NFL players. Until this year, most of his work has come on special teams, not only in returning but in coverage. But the bruised ribs of starter Roy Williams gave Austin his chance and he took advantage of the moment.

“I was confident,” said Austin. “I was ready to go, felt good and I had a good game.”

OFFENSIVE LINE SHUFFLE

When Wade Smith stepped into the huddle to replace the injured Branden Albert at left tackle, he was stepping back in time.

Smith had practiced during the past week at tackle for a few plays every day, but the last time he was on the field in an NFL game at that spot was five years ago, during the 2004 season when he was playing in Miami.

Since then, Smith played center and guard for the Jets and Chiefs. But when Albert suffered an injury to his left ankle, there were only two offensive line bodies on the sidelines available to go in: Smith and another C/G Andy Alleman.

With Albert getting his left ankle taped on the bench, Smith jumped into the spot and ended up playing the rest of the game. He had some good moments, and some tough plays. He gave up a sack and on another player he whiffed in pass protection on DeMarcus Ware and the Dallas linebacker almost decapitated QB Matt Cassel. He was called for holding in the overtime, a penalty that sucked away any momentum the offense had at the time.

“It wasn’t good enough,” Smith said of his play. “If you lose nothing is good enough. I felt fairly comfortable there. We just have to do a better job of getting things done.”

Albert was walking through the Chiefs locker room without much problem after the game, but waved away questions about the injury. If it’s just an ankle sprain, he could be back for Washington. Something more might require some interesting shuffling with the offensive line. Besides the starter at RT Ryan O’Callaghan, the only other tackle on the active roster is Ikechuku Ndukwe, who was inactive on Sunday.

THE ZEBRAS WERE VERY BUSY

Referee Ron Winter’s officiating crew was very busy in this game, which generally means there’s going to be plenty for both teams to complain about to the league office.

There were a total of 20 penalties walked off against both teams for a total of 140 yards. The Chiefs had seven flags for 50 yards. The Cowboys got punched for 13 penalties, losing 90 yards along the way.

The defenseless receiver rule came back into play. Last week, Chiefs FS Jarrad Page was hit with a 15-yard penalty for hitting New York’s Steve Smith while he was in the air. The NFL office said several days later that the call should not have been made. The Cowboys will probably get a similar notice this coming week after S Alan Ball hit WR Bobby Wade in the air.

Haley lost a replay challenge when he threw the red flag on RB Tashard Choice’s 36-yard TD run. He threw it another time early in the game when the officials blew a fumble call. They ruled that forward progress had been stopped for WR Patrick Crayton and that CB Brandon Flowers did not legally punch out the ball. Because of the type of call it was, the play was not reviewable.

Six of the Chiefs seven flags were on offense, with the only defensive penalty being illegal hands to the face penalty against NT Ron Edwards.

The officials also lost one of their own when umpire Bill Schuster got rolled up from behind by Chiefs LB Tamba Hali and had to leave the game for awhile. Eventually, Schuster returned to his spot and finished out the game.

CHIEFS DON’T ENJOY THE EXTRA PERIOD

When it comes to winning in overtime, the Chiefs have not been very successful lately. Sunday’s loss was their fifth straight. The last time they won in the extra period was 2003 in Green Bay, when they beat the Packers 40-34 on a pass from QB Trent Green to WR Eddie Kennison.

The last time they won an overtime game at Arrowhead was in 2001, when they beat Denver 26-23.

NOTES, QUOTES & OTHER STUFF

The only surprise among the Chiefs inactive players for Sunday as veteran WR Bobby Engram. He was a healthy scratch as the Chiefs went with three tight ends for this game … paid attendance was announced at 71,214 and there were plenty of Cowboys fans and they were loud and proud … the Chiefs were five of 17 on third-down conversions for 29 percent. Not very good, but for the KC offense, it was one of their best percentages of the season … the Chiefs got nothing done on special teams beyond P Dustin Colquitt’s 41.3-yard gross and net average. Bobby Wade had two punt returns for six yards, while Jamaal Charles had five returns for 100 yards … Press box stats had ILB Corey Mays leading the Chiefs with nine total tackles … DE Wallace Gilberry had the Chiefs only sack; it his second of the season … DeMarcus Ware had two sacks for Dallas, with LB Keith Brooking and DE Igor Olshansky getting the others … Mike Vrabel’s one-yard TD catch was the 11th score of his career, both regular and post-season play. It was his first scoring catch with the Chiefs … Larry Johnson now had carried the ball more than any other running back in franchise history, as his 1,336 carries tops the old mark set by Priest Holmes of 1,321.