The Dallas Cowboys lost their preseason opener against the Los Angeles Rams which is an amazing feat given that the defense recorded four interceptions.

Cooper Rush started the game at quarterback, but for the most part this was the Trey Lance show. Again as noted the Cowboys defense provided the offense four extra opportunities by way of interceptions off of Stetson Bennett, but not a single touchdown was to be found as they instead settled for four Brandon Aubrey field goals.

The Cowboys took a 12-6 lead into the final minutes of the game before Bennett found redemption and threw what would be the game-winning touchdown. It was an interesting thing to see Lance in action as well as the new kickoff which the Cowboys did their best to manipulate for a heroic last-ditch effort. But nothing worked and they return to Oxnard with an 0-1 record in the preseason.

Below you will find our running update throughout the game re-organized so that it can be read in chronological order.

First Quarter

The Los Angeles Rams began things with a solid drive led by quarterback Stetson Bennett. Marshawn Kneeland stood out on the Dallas side and while the Cowboys did force a fourth down the Rams went for it and Bennett was able to scramble for a first down.

Dallas buckled near the goal line and the Rams ultimately had to settle for a field goal.

The Cowboys took over and it did not take long for Jalen Brooks to make an impact. His first reception of the game went for 43 yards.

Like the Rams the Cowboys settled for a field goal and Brandon Aubrey did what Brandon Aubrey does.

The ball quickly returned to the good guys though as Markquese Bell picked off Stetson Bennett!

The second drive was notable for the Cowboys in that Trey Lance took over at quarterback and Tyler Guyton took over at left tackle.

Lance got to work and took the Cowboys down to near the goal line. On 4th and 1 he threw just over the arms of Jalen Cropper for a turnover on downs. It was a productive drive for him, though. They just couldn’t cash in.

Second Quarter

The quarter began with an update that tackle Chuma Edoga had a foot injury (it was specified to be a toe issue) for Dallas and would not return. That is hardly a spot where Dallas can afford to lose anybody. Also of note as the period began cornerback Eric Scott Jr. was called for an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty.

The Rams took over from where Trey Lance and the Cowboys couldn’t convert for a drive that began at their own 3-yard line. While they themselves failed to find the endzone they did walk away with points by way of another field goal. Allowing your opponent to score after starting on their own 3-yard line is not ideal.

Notably Cooper Beebe took over at center as the Cowboys marched back out. Trey Lance sprinkled things along and hit a variety of receivers from Jalen Cropper to David Durden. John Stephens Jr. even had a catch. Unfortunately Ryan Flournoy and Malik Davis could not keep the party going and field goal festivities continued and Brandon Aubrey squared the game once more.

Like with their first drive the Rams faced a fourth down and went for it yet again. They picked it up by way of rookie Jordan Whittington who was everywhere across the first half of the game.

Los Angeles seemed to be picking on Eric Scott Jr. and he was looking like the clear poor performer on the team in the first half. Until he had an interception!

Sometimes that is just the way things go.

Third Quarter

Dallas received the ball to start the second half and got moving a little bit. To this point in the game Ryan Flournoy had failed to really pop and after a drop he hauled in a nice catch while in traffic.

Unfortunately he moved early before a snap shortly after and set Dallas up with a second and long that they could not recover from. Mike McCarthy went for it on 4th and 6 and this time was a lot less close for Trey Lance than the fourth down attempt earlier in the game.

The Rams wound up punting which was certainly a rare thing for this game. Dallas took over and saw Trey Lance make an amazing play where he broke a tackle and scrambled for a first down but ultimately the Cowboys settled for a field goal attempt… from 65 yards out.

To no one’s surprise it was no good. The distance to gain on the down in question was 9 yards and you have to wonder if more could have been gained from going for it as opposed to a hail mary of a field goal attempt, but that was Mike McCarthy’s call.

It didn’t matter though as shortly after the Cowboys recorded their third interception of Stetson Bennett. This one belonged to Julius Wood.

Hard to be mad about 3 interceptions in a game.

Fourth Quarter

Things began with Dallas holding the ball after the Julius Wood interception and like they did for most of the game to that point… they found themselves facing a fourth down.

Given the exhibition nature of it all Mike McCarthy went for it again and Trey Lance could not find anything before ultimately taking a sack. Hardly the most impressive moment.

The Rams wound up punting the ball back to the Cowboys and Trey Lance dialed in a little bit. Soon enough the Cowboys found themselves in field goal range once again and this time Brandon Aubrey was true. It helped that it wasn’t from 65 yards out.

LA took over down by three and looking to pull off something special. It was at this moment that Stetson Bennett threw his fourth interception of the game. Seriously.

Brock Mogensen’s run back set the Cowboys up with incredibly promising field position, but Trey Lance took a sack on first down and a screen pass that got blown up on third down moved Dallas back significantly. Overall the loss was 11 yards which set Brandon Aubrey up for a 52-yard attempt, but he is Brandon Aubrey so all worked out.

But the Rams rallied as they were trailing by only six points. Bennett looked to throw his fifth interception of the game, but it was called back thanks to a hold in the Dallas secondary.

As fate would have it this day belonged to the Los Angeles Rams. After struggling near the goal line the Rams scored the game’s first touchdown in the final 10 seconds of the contest. Stetson Bennett got his moment.

That was the game.

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Notable Recent News

On Friday the Cowboys traded cornerback Nahshon Wright to the Minnesota Vikings in exchange for Andrew Booth. It marked the second year in a row that they made a cornerback for cornerback swap with another team.

You can read more about Andrew Booth and what he offers the team right here.

Injury Updates

Obviously there are no inactives in the preseason, but there was a pseudo sort of list that emerged just before kickoff.

Latest on CeeDee Lamb

The last significant thing to happen with CeeDee Lamb, his holdout and where things stand with the Dallas Cowboys occurred at practice this past week when a Jerry Jones quote about a lack of urgency on the issue caused CeeDee to tweet “lol” in response.

NFL Network Ian Rapoport discussed the matter on Sunday morning as well and noted it is just a matter of the Cowboys reaching CeeDee’s price point.

“It’s really just a matter of the Dallas Cowboys getting to where CeeDee Lamb needs it to be, getting the kind of substantial deal that one of the best receivers in the NFL get. It’s just a matter of when the Dallas Cowboys decide to do it.”

Jerry Jones offered an apologize of sorts on Sunday.

Up Next For The Cowboys

• Monday, August 12th: Off Day
• Tuesday, August 13th: Practice at 2pm ET (Oxnard)
• Wednesday, August 14th: Off Day
• Thursday, August 15th: Practice at 2pm ET (Oxnard)
• Friday, August 16th: Off Day
• Saturday, August 17th: Preseason Game #2 at Las Vegas Raiders (10pm ET kickoff)

Sunday brings us the first Dallas Cowboys preseason game of 2024. After a long, drama-filled offseason, we finally get to see the players in action as they take on the Los Angeles Rams.

As is often the case in the preseason, most of the starters aren’t going to see the field for Dallas. They’ll instead send many of their younger players out there as they fight for a position on the 53-man roster.

MORE: Cowboys linked to former NFC East foe if RB-by-committee underwhelms

There will also be several young players trying to prove they can hold down a starting spot. That includes Tyler Guyton, who is fighting for the left tackle position and Cooper Beebe, who looks to unseat Brock Hoffman. There will be plenty of eyes on each of them but one rookie could stand out above them all in Preseason Week 1, Ryan Flournoy.

Ryan Flournoy looks to continue building upon impressive offseason

Rookie wideout Ryan Flournoy has been impressive throughout the offseason programs. The 6-foot-1, 200-pounder was selected in the sixth-round out of Southeast Missouri State.

He’s been so impressive throughout camp that he was drawing comparisons to Dez Bryant.

Obviously, the Cowboys don’t expect him to be the same caliber player as Bryant but they’re going to utilize him often against the Rams to see if he can continue to get the job done in a game setting. Don’t be surprised if he rises to the occasion and continues to make believers out of everyone.

— Enjoy free coverage of the Cowboys from Dallas Cowboys on SI —

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Camp Battles: 6 surprising notes from Cowboys first unofficial depth chart

Cowgirls: Meet Reece Allman: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader

Regular readers of this page know we are tough critics of Dallas City Hall.

There have been plenty of reasons for us to persistently raise concerns: policies we think hamper the city’s success, managerial failures that gummed up the city’s permitting department, an ever-rising cost of government, and ongoing decline in resident satisfaction with everything from their sense of safety to a belief that the city is heading in the wrong direction.

So let us take a moment here to say that there is a good reason for renewed hope in how City Hall is handling its business. It came in the form of interim City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert’s proposed budget for the coming fiscal year.

What we saw in both an executive overview and in an interview with Tolbert and her top staff was a disciplined budget focused on the right priorities for a city that leads a growing region.

Here are the highlights that stood out as indicators Tolbert is properly aligning her budget with residents’ desire that Dallas be safer and cleaner and that City Hall better manage its spending:

• A 3.1-cent tax rate reduction to 70.47 cents per $100 in valuation that would save the average homeowner more than $94 a year.
• A consolidation of several city departments and a meaningful reduction in the number of non-public safety positions.
• A serious commitment to meeting actuarial obligations in the city’s police and fire pension fund.
• An increase in public safety starting salaries to attract more recruits to our police force.
• A proposed $3 monthly “clean sweep” utility bill fee to answer resident concerns about homeless encampments and persistent messes around intersections and in public spaces.

Those are just a few bullets of a complex $5 billion total proposed budget, with $1.9 billion of that devoted to the general fund budget that pays for day-to-day operations.

Tolbert told us that she felt she had clear direction on where residents want her to go with this budget, and that was to focus on public safety and quality-of-life issues.

The general fund budget is set to grow by $65.1 million under Tolbert’s proposal. But let us offer some valuable context to that figure.

Under prior City Manager T.C. Broadnax, the general fund grew at a pace of more than $100 million each cycle. With each new budget came an unnecessary expansion of the city’s reach, and with it new jobs that grew the bureaucracy even as residents complained services were getting worse. We supported Broadnax’s most recent budget, but reluctantly and with every sort of caveat.

We are more enthusiastic about the direction Tolbert is taking the city. The growth she has added to the general fund is focused on new public safety positions, mainly in the police department. She’s backing that up with the proposed salary increase that we think can make Dallas more competitive in getting recruits.

Meanwhile, she is proposing cutting back on positions outside of public safety. Her budget includes an additional $78.6 million in public safety spending. That means there is a net $13.5 million reduction in all other general fund expenditures. That comes in part from targeting “ghost jobs,” positions that lard the budget but aren’t filled. But it also comes from reducing some headcount, a fiscally necessary move.

We also heard Tolbert describe a subtle but important shift in the approach to homelessness. Like many cities, Dallas has followed a very light enforcement regimen when it comes to encampments, loitering, panhandling, open-air drug use and other actions often (and sometimes unfairly) associated with homelessness. The city has instead adopted a humane “housing first” philosophy. It has proved ineffective, however, in addressing the massive growth in encampments and visible homelessness that have become a major concern for residents. Leaving people to live in desperate circumstances until an apartment is available is unintentionally cruel in itself.

Tolbert described an approach that acknowledges, in her words, that the city’s progress on getting people housed is “not enough.” Greater intervention is required, she said. We are eager to see what plans she has to back that up.

Meanwhile, her proposed $3 monthly fee to help address unsanitary conditions that have taken root all over the city sounds like something residents would gladly pay. The explosion in homelessness has created challenges that cities didn’t budget for. Underpasses, medians, vacant lots and other spaces have become debris fields that make living in Dallas less pleasant. Devoting funds to keeping the city cleaner would make Dallas more livable and lead to a greater feeling of safety. We support that.

That isn’t the only fee that needs attention here. Other than the tax rate, you can expect to pay City Hall more for every service from water to trash pickup. We want to grumble about these costs. Their annual increase is as certain as the rising sun.

But we also have to acknowledge a few things. Dallas is the biggest municipal water waster in the state. Why? The pipes are old and broken. Fixing them is massively expensive. Trash pickup has gotten pricier, especially as more frequent and stronger storms create enormous bulk trash costs that the city hasn’t had to bear historically.

Is Tolbert’s budget perfect? It is not. There are many areas that we could nitpick, and we are going to have more to say before all is said and done.

But the direction here is good and, importantly, different from what her predecessor offered. This is a budget that feels like it reflects what people in this city consistently say they want.

That means Tolbert has been listening. And that’s a huge step forward.

We welcome your thoughts in a letter to the editor. See the guidelines and submit your letter here. If you have problems with the form, you can submit via email at letters@dallasnews.com