Sunday, December 13, 1998

Cowboys' response to loss is Chief concern

By David Moore

The Dallas Morning News

(KRT)

KANSAS CITY -- Quarterback Troy Aikman likes to talk about how December defines teams in the NFL.

The first entry under "Cowboys" for this month isn't flattering.

Dallas has had six days to dwell on why it was so ill-prepared for its game with New Orleans. The Cowboys' first chance to atone for their 22-3 indiscretion comes Sunday afternoon against the Kansas City Chiefs at Arrowhead Stadium.

A Dallas victory -- or an Arizona loss to Philadelphia earlier in the afternoon -- will secure the NFC East title for the Cowboys.

The Chiefs aren't playing for a division title. Kansas City has stumbled the way Dallas did last season and is braced to endure its first losing season in 10 years.

That doesn't mean this is a team to be dismissed. Kansas City has won 10 consecutive games against the NFC and 16 of its last 18 interconference affairs. The last NFC team to beat Kansas City was Dallas with a 24-12 victory on Thanksgiving Day in '95.

The Chiefs haven't lost at home to an NFC team in more than four years. Even when times are rough, the NFC has been their life preserver. The Chiefs' only win in the last eight weeks was at Arrowhead Stadium against the Cardinals.

Why has the franchise enjoyed this sort of success against the NFC?

"I really don't know why," Chiefs' Coach Marty Schottenheimer said. "I don't know if there are any specific things that I would see that are different."

The Cowboys saw a difference -- a disturbing difference -- in their offense last week. New Orleans blitzed Dallas into submission, holding a previously potent offense to a franchise-low eight rushing yards and a season-low 182 total yards.

Coach Chan Gailey and the players are treating the performance as an aberration. Even with last week's game, the Cowboys offense is averaging 25.7 points in the six games since Aikman returned from a fractured collarbone.

Still, a potential weakness has been exposed.

"Do I expect teams to come in and blitz again?" Cowboys' receiver Michael Irvin said. "Yeah, that's the way the league works. I expect teams to take some things from what New Orleans did and come in and try to hurt us with it."

It has been suggested that how the Cowboys respond from last week's loss is their biggest challenge so far this season. That appears to be an overstatement. This challenge doesn't compare to the second week of the season, when the team was drilled by Denver and lost Aikman to an injury.

That doesn't mean Sunday's game won't be revealing. Gailey has lamented that this team lacks a sense of urgency. How it responds should say a lot.

"It's not like our season has come to an end because we had a bad game on offense," Gailey said. "We've still got a lot of football left and a lot of great things that can happen to us."

Gailey has found himself walking a fine line the past few days. He didn't want to minimize how poor last week's performance was and how upset everyone should be. He wants that loss to sting. He wants it to serve notice that the Cowboys aren't good enough to take any team for granted.

But he doesn't want to wallow in the negatives, either.

"It's not like we've been the scum of the earth over here the previous few weeks," Gailey said. "We had been playing fairly decently.

"You balance yourself by saying, 'We have been decent, but this was bad.' How do you learn and get back over here?"

Some teams are talented enough to put it on autopilot entering the playoffs. The Cowboys proved last week that they aren't one of those teams. The goal is to build some momentum going into the first round.

"We would like to," Gailey said. "Do we have to? No. We don't have to.

"But I've seen very few teams go all the way that haven't been playing fairly good at the end."

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