Nathan Rourke’s 21-yard touchdown pass to Qadree Ollison with 3:56 remaining in the fourth quarter helped the Jacksonville Jaguars hang on and defeat the Dallas Cowboys, 28-23, as the teams opened preseason play at AT&T Stadium on Saturday.
Jacksonville scored twice in the final 8:53 after giving up the lead for the first time on Deuce Vaughn’s first NFL touchdown run in the third quarter. The Cowboys responded with a touchdown off a fumble recovery but could not complete the comeback.
The game started well for Dallas as Juanyeh Thomas intercepted Trevor Lawrence on the second play from scrimmage. Yet, the offense could not capitalize as the teams traded punts.
A KaVontae Turpin fumble on a punt return gave Jacksonville the ball in Dallas territory, and it quickly found the end zone on a pass from Lawrence to Texas A&M alum Christian Kirk, taking an 8-0 lead as Zay Jones made a leaping grab on the two-point conversion.
Dallas mounted one of its best drives of the day on the ensuing possession, but Rico Dowdle fumbled as he appeared to be diving toward the end zone, and Jacksonville recovered.
The Cowboys finally got on the scoreboard on a touchdown pass from Will Grier to Jalen Tolbert before the half. Plano native Brandon Aubrey converted on his first NFL field goal attempt to start the third quarter, and Vaughn took the ball into the end zone from four yards out following a turnover on downs.
Rourke responded with a touchdown run of his own and made an incredible throw as he broke tackles and flung the ball down the field — while still being grasped by defenders — to Ollison to increase the lead.
Will Grier added a late touchdown pass to John Stephens to cut the deficit to five, but Jacksonville ran out the clock.
Grier struggled with his accuracy early, throwing two bad interceptions, but had one nullified by a penalty and recovered to finish with 199 yards and two touchdown passes. Vaughn added 50 yards and the touchdown on eight carries.
Rourke finished with 173 total yards for Jacksonville.
***
WHAT TO KNOW
— The Cowboys played none of their starters, while Jacksonville played its for two series against Dallas’ backups.
— Rookie running back Vaughn played his first game at AT&T Stadium since running for 130 yards and being named the most valuable player in the Big 12 championship game in December.
— Second-year player Jake Ferguson started at tight end, while Malik Davis started at running back.
— Jacksonville did not attempt a single field goal on Saturday.
***
BY THE NUMBERS
— Cooper Rush started the game at quarterback for Dallas and threw for 83 yards on 10-of-12 passing. Rush and Grier combined for 246 passing yards, two touchdowns, and an interception on 43 passing attempts.
— At one point, Grier had completed 15 consecutive passes.
— Aubrey made his only field goal attempt and was two for three on extra points in his NFL debut.
— The Cowboys ended the game with 376 total yards in Mike McCarthy’s first game as the offensive play-caller, including 201 yards in the second half.
— Dallas had three turnovers, while Jacksonville had two.
***
WHO SAID
— Head coach Mike McCarthy on his approach to the first preseason game: “Based off the personnel, [our] playing-time focal point was really to get our young guys as much work and really balance it out through the course of the game. A lot of guys were available for all four quarters. We wanted to give them the feel of a Sunday regular season game.”
— McCarthy on the team’s performance: “I thought we got off to a solid start, but there are a lot of good things to learn from. I really loved the energy that our young guys played with, especially the young bunch that got to play against their first group in the first couple of series…”
***
NEXT UP
— The Cowboys (0-1) travel to Seattle to take on the Seahawks (1-0) in their second preseason game at 9 p.m. CDT on Saturday, August 19.