Despite a very disappointing end to the season that saw his Dallas Cowboys lose to the No. 7 seed Green Bay Packers in the Wild Card round of the playoffs, Jerry Jones is sticking with Mike McCarthy as his head coach.
"I believe this team is very close and capable of achieving our ultimate goals and the best step forward for us will be with Mike McCarthy as our head coach. There is great benefit to continuing the team's progress under Mike's leadership as our head coach," Jones said in a statement released Wednesday. "Specifically, there are many layers of success that have occurred this season as a result of Mike's approach to leading the team, both with individual players and with our team collectively. Mike has the highest regular season winning percentage of any head coach in Cowboys history and we will dedicate ourselves, in partnership with him, to translating that into reaching our post season goals. Certainly, Mike's career has demonstrated post season success at a high level, and we have great confidence that can continue.
"Further, our loss on Sunday is shared by everyone here, not just Coach McCarthy. Our players. Our coaches. Our front office. Myself. There is accountability for our results. I am accountable for our results. The lens we use to view and evaluate Coach McCarthy is holistic. While we're all disappointed with the result on Sunday and with our playoff record, I am 100 percent supportive of him as our head coach and ability to reach our goals.
We will start our process of review and decision making regarding everything that impacts our team and roster and, while we're not going to address specific players and extensions or free agents at this point, it deserves our deepest review and consideration, and it will get it."
ESPN's Adam Schefter was the first to report the news of McCarthy's return.
In his four years at the helm in Dallas, McCarthy led the Cowboys to a 42-25 record in the regular season, including three straight 12-win seasons and two NFC East titles. However, his failure to lead the organization to its first NFC Championship Game since 1996 will result in him having to coach next season under the final year of his contract.
After finishing his first season with a record of 6-10, thanks in part to several injuries to key players, including quarterback Dak Prescott, McCarthy led Dallas to three straight playoff appearances. In 2021 and 2022, Dallas lost in the Wild Card and Divisional Round to the San Francisco 49ers by one score.
The Cowboys entered this postseason as the No. 2 seed and had eyes on making a deep run. But Dallas came out flat and suffered what Jones described as '"one of my biggest surprises I've been involved in sport," falling 48-32 to a quarterback making his first career postseason start.
McCarthy has one playoff win with Dallas, which came in the 2022 Wild Card round when Dallas beat Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 31-14.
