After spending all week getting increasingly more worried that Dak Prescott might not play in Minnesota against the Vikings, it ended up not mattering at all. Well, sort of. The Cowboys probably would have won by multiple scores Sunday night had Prescott suited up, but the end result was still the same.
Making his first career start, Cooper Rush threw for 325 yards and hit Amari Cooper for a beautiful touchdown in the back of the endzone to give the Cowboys a 20-16 victory. In a week when the undefeated Cardinals lost on Thursday night and the Buccaneers (who obviously hold a head-to-head tiebreaker over the Cowboys) dropped their second game of the year on Sunday, this win was a huge boost to the Cowboys’ chances at securing a first-round bye in the playoffs some day soon.