Matt Eberflus sends a crystal clear message about the expectations for the 2025 Dallas Cowboys defense and his resume backs it up
Matt Eberflus will be the Dallas Cowboys' third consecutive defensive coordinator with previous head coaching experience, following the footsteps of Dan Quinn and Mike Zimmer, both of which set the bar high during their brief stints on the team. Eberflus differs from both Quinn and Zimmer in that he's much more conservative in the blitzing and […]
Matt Eberflus will be the Dallas Cowboys' third consecutive defensive coordinator with previous head coaching experience, following the footsteps of Dan Quinn and Mike Zimmer, both of which set the bar high during their brief stints on the team.
Eberflus differs from both Quinn and Zimmer in that he's much more conservative in the blitzing and disguising department, sticking to a more traditional style of defense that heavily relies on strong fundamentals.
On Tuesday, Eberflus spoke to the media for the first time since being hired as defensive coordinator under Brian Schottenheimer and he defined clear expectations for his unit in 2025 and beyond.
"It’s pretty simple, we take the ball away," Eberflus told reporters via The Athletic's Jon Machota. "That’s what we do. We stop the run. We want to make exciting plays for our football team. That’s really what we do.”
Naturally, you might be thinking what I did upon reading the quote: What coach would say something different? And that's a fair concern. You can chalk it up to coach speak.
However, Eberflus' resume backs him up. In 2024, Eberflus' Bears finished 10th in takeaways. The year before that, he had Chicago at 5th. In four years as the Colts defensive coordinator, his defenses finished 10th, 11th, 5th and 2nd in total takeaways.
Philadelphia Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni, now a Super Bowl-winning head coach, credits his team's attention to creating takeaways to Eberflus.
"We do a lot of drills that go into (forcing turnovers), we talk a lot about that, we show any time that there's a missed opportunity to take the ball away," Sirianni told reporters after the NFC Championship Game. "That's something I learned as I watched Matt Eberflus and how he preached defense of how you take the ball away, I really learned a lot from him when I was in Indy with him."
It's true, words in February mean nothing for the success of a team. But when Eberflus preaches taking the football away, it's hard to ignore the fact that his defenses have been able to do it. He deserves the benefit of the doubt.
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