Dak Prescott had one of the worst games of his professional career when the Dallas Cowboys took on the Washington Commanders on the final week of the regular season. He completed only 14 of his 37 passes – a terrible 37.8 percent – and the Cowboys struggled all game long as a result en route to a 26-6 loss. This set them up for a date against Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the Wild Card round, not the most enticing matchup given Brady's postseason pedigree.
But Dak Prescott proceeded to redeem his putrid performance vs. the Commanders with the best game of his career. Prescott was dominant all night long, and he finished 25/33 for 305 yards on the night with five touchdown contributions, a monstrous effort to lead the Cowboys to a 31-14 victory, no small feat against a Tom Brady-led team.
Understandably, many heaped lofty praise towards the 29-year old quarterback. Even Cowboys legend Troy Aikman, who led the franchise to three Super Bowl wins, was thoroughly impressed with what he saw from Prescott.
“It may be the best game of his career. I’ve never seen him play better,” Aikman said while calling the game for ESPN.
Dak Prescott's dominance also wowed Cowboys owner Jerry Jones; if there's anyone he'd like to impress, you'd have to think it'd be the guy who cuts his checks.
“He has showed in the right setting and the right circumstances, he showed me he’s maybe the top — certainly the NFC — quarterback,” Jones said, per Jon Machota of The Athletic. “I think just in the face of it, he took it right on, Brady and all of it, and just said, ‘Here, I’m going to show you.’”
Amid all of the doubt hurled towards Prescott, his Cowboys teammates couldn't help but be proud of how their quarterback has been able to weather all of that adversity and channel it into the best of game of his career in arguably the most pressure-packed game he has played in.
“You can’t get him down. He’s going to keep swinging, and that’s what he did tonight,” right guard Zack Martin said.
“Dak showed that he’s a warrior. I feel like it was a statement game for him,” wide receiver CeeDee Lamb added.
Nevertheless, Dak Prescott's stellar performance did not surprise head coach Mike McCarthy and linebacker Micah Parsons in the slightest. In fact, they expect Prescott to continue rolling the way he did against the Buccaneers.
“(He was) as good as I’ve seen. […] He puts the time in. […] So, I’m not surprised at all that he responded,” McCarthy said.
“We all expect it,” Parsons said. “He steps up when he has to.”
And for their playoff run's sake, they will need their quarterback to continue to play like he did against the Buccaneers on Monday night.
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