ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Dak Prescott wasn’t having it when teammates started congratulating Dallas’ star quarterback for breaking one of Tony Romo’s records as the Cowboys were trying to rally from 21 points down against the defending Super Bowl champs.
Save it for the win, he said.
Cue the celebration.
Prescott threw two touchdown passes, ran for the tying score and led the drive to Brandon Aubrey’s 42-yard field goal as time expired as the Cowboys beat the Philadelphia Eagles 24-21 in a mistake-filled thriller Sunday.
“Now I can enjoy that a little bit,” Prescott said of topping Romo’s career franchise record for yards passing, throwing for 354 yards to end the day with 34,378. “I can tell you initially when I looked up and saw my name up there and saw that, there was a little emotion that hit me that I damn sure wasn’t ready for and didn’t know that would come.
“And I think that’s why I countered that with anger of, ‘No, no no, let that go. We’ll celebrate this later.’”
Prescott also broke a tie with Romo by leading his 25th winning drive when tied or trailing in the fourth quarter or overtime.
The Cowboys (5-5-1) converted on their third tiebreaking chance in the fourth quarter to extend Prescott’s home winning streak against NFC East opponents to 19 in their first game at AT&T Stadium since the death of defensive end Marshawn Kneeland.
The Eagles (8-3) are still in good shape to be the first repeat winners in the NFC East since they won four in a row from 2001-04, but the offense reverted to the form that has frustrated A.J. Brown after the star receiver had a big hand in the 21-0 lead early in the second quarter.
Philadelphia lost with a lead of at least 21 points for the first time since 1999, when Arizona beat the Eagles 25-24. It was the first win for Dallas when trailing by three touchdowns since the Cowboys beat the Rams 34-31 in 2014.
“I’m not going to make any sweeping judgments at this particular time,” Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said. “When there’s a lot of mistakes that we had, some of the self-inflicted wounds that we had today, I’m always going to put that on me as the head coach.”
Prescott broke Romo’s record on a 9-yard pass to George Pickens on his first throw of the second half, with Dallas down 21-7. Romo, the 10-year starter before Prescott’s current run that is just as long, had 34,183 yards passing.
The Cowboys made all the mistakes early, including two penalties to keep alive Philadelphia’s second touchdown drive and Tyler Guyton’s false start from the 1 that led to Prescott’s interception in the end zone that kept the deficit at 21-0.
The Eagles had all the miscues late, starting with Saquon Barkley’s first fumble of the season. After Dallas failed to convert that chance, Xavier Gipson fumbled inside the 10 on a punt return after unwisely fielding the ball at the Philadelphia 2.
Alijah Clark was given credit for forcing the fumble when he shared the big hit on Gipson with Markquese Bell after getting knocked down right after the snap and almost falling two other times while running downfield.
Prescott couldn’t get Dallas in the end zone with three tries from the 2, the last when coach Brian Schottenheimer went for the touchdown instead of the field goal and Prescott’s pass to Jake Ferguson was short of the goal line and incomplete.
Osa Odighizuwa gave the Cowboys one more chance by sacking Jalen Hurts on third down with 1:52 remaining. The Cowboys got to run out the clock to set up for the winning field goal after Prescott’s 24-yard completion to Pickens, who had nine catches for 146 yards and a touchdown.
“You’ve heard me say it a thousand times,” Schottenheimer said. “You can’t win the game in the first quarter, second, third, but you can win the game in the fourth quarter. I told them, ‘Believe. Believe in each other and believe in the fact that we’ll find a way to do it.’”
Brown had five catches for 67 yards in the first quarter, including a 16-yard touchdown for the first points, but didn’t have another grab until the fourth quarter.
Hurts threw for a touchdown and ran for two scores, but couldn’t get the running game going to protect the lead. Barkley was held to 22 yards on 10 carries.
“We’ve got to find a way to finish the game and we’ve got to find some consistency in what we do,” Hurts said. “Definitely a tale of two halves, but in the end, we didn’t play a complete game as a team.”
Pickens scored Dallas’ first TD on a 1-yard catch, and CeeDee Lamb had a 48-yard grab to set up Brevyn Spann-Ford’s first career touchdown on a 4-yarder to get Dallas within a score late in the third quarter.
Prescott’s tying TD came when he scrambled left and dived over the goal line to finish the 8-yard run early in the fourth.
“A game like this is all about confidence and belief in one another,” Prescott said. “When you’re down 21-0 early like that to one of the best teams in the league, defending Super Bowl champion, (you) keep your resilience high and stay focused and understand that you’ve got a chance.”
Kneeland tributes
Odighizuwa, who shared the defensive line room with Kneeland, was the last starter announced and ran onto the field carrying a flag with Kneeland’s name and jersey number, 94. The Cowboys showed a video tribute on the giant screens above the field before a moment of silence.
Injuries
Eagles: CB Adoree’ Jackson was evaluated for a concussion. … S Reed Blankenship injured a thigh.
Cowboys: LT Tyler Guyton injured an ankle.
Up next
Eagles: Play Chicago at home Friday.
Cowboys: Face Kansas City in annual home Thanksgiving game Thursday.
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