USAToday Inside Slant: Dallas Cowboys

After game one, Mr. Fix It, as Wade Phillips calls himself, needs to find a new wrench.
The Cowboys won the season opener but gave up 35 points and 438 yards of offense to the Giants.

Yes, the Cowboys didn't have all their weapons with linebacker Greg Ellis and cornerback Terence Newman sidelined and then losing nose tackle Jason Ferguson in the first quarter.

But the troubling thing is the Cowboys blamed many of their problems on mental and assignment issues by veteran players.

That was the problem when Plaxico Burress got behind cornerback Anthony Henry for a 60-yard touchdown in the first quarter. Burress had three touchdowns in the game.

"I think the players will do (better)," Phillips said. "I think we'll see what we did. You'll be surprised, and they'll be surprised by some of the things. Of course, there are some little things that we can do better. And we made too many mental mistakes — assignment mistakes. That's what we pride ourselves on, not making assignment mistakes. We made quite a few of those. We're not a big-play give-up defense. To have one early in the game like that I think threw us on our heels a little bit. But they'll bounce back."

Henry and the Cowboys players are very concerned that if they don't improve quickly, it will be a long season on defense.

"We gave up a lot of yards," Henry said. "Teams are going to look at that. They are going to see ways they can try to hit us.

"It was a bittersweet win, if we don't get in and correct the things, then it's going to be a problem for us throughout the season."

Linebacker DeMarcus Ware said he thought the Cowboys were past these efforts. He said the Cowboys came into the season hoping to attack on defense and they were under siege by the Giants.

"We were attacking," Ware said. "But we were the ones getting bombed on. We better be past it next week."

NOTES, QUOTES

—Cowboys owner Jerry Jones gave coach Wade Phillips a game ball following the 45-35 victory against the Giants Sunday. On Monday, Phillips gave out game balls to five players, including quarterback Tony Romo, tight end Jason Witten, cornerback Jacques Reeves, center Andre Gurode and receiver Terrell Owens.

Owens' big day included three catches for 87 yards and two touchdowns. But he was given a game ball because of his positive attitude at halftime after going catch-less in the first half.

"I told them in the meeting, we tried to connect with him several times in the first half and just quite didn't get it done," Phillips said. "He came in at halftime and had just as good an attitude as any of our players; in fact, he was urging everybody on to play well in the second half. I thought that was special; he thought of the team first at halftime."

—The Cowboys scored 45 points in the season opener against the Giants. It was the most by the Cowboys team in the opener since 1971. It also tied for the most points scored by a Cowboys team during the last four years.

The Cowboys were fourth in the NFL in scoring last year. They will be explosive again. And because of the injury concerns on defense, they will have to continue to be high octane to win.