The Patriots may have dodged a bullet or two in Sunday's 13-9 win over the Cowboys.
Dallas was called for two tripping penalties, but apparently they should not have been called. According to The Athletic’s Jon Machota, the NFL told Dallas their offensive line shouldn’t have been called for the two tripping penalties.
Prior to Sunday, there had only been seven tripping penalties called all year in the NFL.
Early in the game, left tackle Tyron Smith was called for a trip on the drive that ended with the blocked punt. The second was on the Cowboys’ final drive of the game on center Travis Frederick, which negated a first down catch and was a pretty big deal.
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was frustrated with his team's play afterwards.
"Make no mistake about it, this was a bigger game [for the Cowboys] than it was for the Patriots on the win column," Jones said. "We had an opportunity to establish something. There is no gratification getting down to the last drive with it determining the outcome of the game. That is not the point. You can't be satisfied with how we got out there.
"I don't care if it is New England with their record and their coach and all that. You can't be satisfied just because you got within the last drive. I'm just really frustrated. I thought we could come up here and put together a better effort in all three phases. I expected us to play well against them defensively. We got what I think we should have expected from our defense. The other phases of the game, we can't come up here and play like that."
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