The Cowboys will host the NFC South-leading Buccaneers on "Sunday Night Football." The matchup pits one of the best teams in the conference, Tampa Bay, led by quarterback Baker Mayfield, against one of the hottest. Dallas, after having started the season 3-7, have won of three of their last four.
Who will come out victorious from AT&T Stadium? Stay with NBC News all night for the latest.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Dallas Cowboys
Date: Dec. 22
Time: 8:15 p.m. ET
How to watch: NBC or stream on Peacock
Brandon Aubrey warmups
The Cowboys' star kicker ahead of tonight's big game.
Bucs trying to hold off Atlanta
The race for the NFC South division championship and the postseason berth that comes with winning a division title will be close. Earlier today, Atlanta and new starting quarterback Michael Penix Jr. beat the Giants to improve to 8-7. As we broke down below, the Falcons hold the tiebreaker on the Buccaneers (8-6 entering ‘Sunday Night Football’), meaning Atlanta would get the edge if it finishes tied with the Buccaneers at season’s end. Tonight, Atlanta just became big fans of Dallas.
Cowboys already eliminated from postseason
Washington’s victory against Philadelphia earlier Sunday mathematically eliminated Dallas from making the postseason. According to Cowboys beat reporter Todd Archer, this is the earliest that Dallas has been eliminated from playoff contention in seven years.
Big-game Bucky
Tampa Bay has produced just eight 1,000-yard rushers in franchise history. This season, Bucky Irving is on pace to join that small club in only his first NFL season. Irving, who played at Oregon, currently has 852 yards with three games remaining. If Irving crosses the 1,000-yard threshold, he would be the youngest to do it in Buccaneers history.
Can Dallas score enough to keep up?
Since starting Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott was lost for the season with a hamstring injury in Week 9, Dallas has ranked next-to-last in the league in expected points added per play, an advanced statistic that attempts to analyze a team’s efficiency. It also ranks fourth-worst in expected points added per dropback, and sixth-worse when rushing the ball.
The Cowboys’ challenge will be keeping up with Tampa, whose overall EPA per play ranks fourth-best during their current four-game winning streak.
No place like home?
Dallas is 1-7 at AT&T Stadium since the end of the 2023 regular season and most losses were not close, with double-digit deficits in six of the seven losses. While that would be a black eye for any franchise, the contrast is especially stark for the Cowboys given that before that 1-7 stretch, they had won 16 consecutive home games, their longest home winning streak since 1982.
The stakes on 'Sunday Night Football'
At 8-6, Tampa is currently projected as a No. 3 seed in the NFC and would host Green Bay in a first-round game. But the Buccaneers are also far from assured of clinching their playoff berth; in the NFC South, they sit just one game ahead of the 7-7 Falcons, who would hold a tiebreaker as Atlanta swept the Bucs this season. Tampa is guaranteed to win the division and make the playoffs if it wins its last three games — and all three of those opponents have losing records — but one slip-up could cost them.
For Dallas, there is also uncertainty about what lies ahead. Coach Mike McCarthy is 48-33 overall and 1-3 in the playoffs with two NFC East titles in five seasons with the Cowboys but his contract runs out after this season. Cowboys players including star defender Micah Parsons have publicly vouched for McCarthy to return in 2025
Stephen Jones, the Cowboys’ executive vice president of personnel, said after league meetings last week that McCarthy had done an “outstanding” job of keeping Dallas in the playoff picture, even if slim, via their mini-turnaround of the past month. Jones said a decision on McCarthy’s future would take a wider view.
“When you’re owning/managing a football team, you look at everything. It would be irresponsible not to,” Jones said about considering the team’s injuries in an evaluation of McCarthy’s job performance. “I know our fans and opponents don’t look at everything but we do.”
Streaky season in Tampa
It’s been either boom-or-bust this season in Tampa. The Buccaneers were a team every opponent wanted to play in October. But since, they’ve been on a tear. Since losing four straight games to drop to 4-6, the Bucs have won four consecutive games, and tonight can extend that to five consecutive victories for the first time since 2016. This is Tampa’s last road game of the regular season.
Despite losing starting quarterback Dak Prescott to a hamstring injury in November, the Cowboys also enter tonight on something close to a turnaround. Since falling to 3-7, the Cowboys have won three of their last four games to enter tonight’s game at 6-8.
