Sports · NEWS EXPLAINER
Lamb’s 17 catches lift Cowboys past Texans, 34–30
Dallas overturned a 16–6 halftime deficit, lost the lead again and answered with CeeDee Lamb’s touchdown catch with 40 seconds left.
CeeDee Lamb caught 17 passes for 189 yards as the Dallas Cowboys beat the Houston Texans 34–30 on October 4. His final reception produced the winning touchdown with 40 seconds remaining.
Dallas scored 28 points after halftime, with Javonte Williams supplying three rushing touchdowns before Lamb’s finish. The Cowboys recovered from a ten-point deficit, then had to regain the lead once more.
Four touchdowns change the second half
Dallas’s first-half scoring came from two Brandon Aubrey field goals. Houston had a touchdown and three field goals, leaving the Cowboys behind 16–6 at the break. The second-half scoring totals—28 for Dallas and 14 for Houston—show how that deficit became a four-point victory.
Williams scored on runs of eight, one and two yards. His first touchdown cut the gap to three, but Houston restored its ten-point advantage before his next two scores. The third rushing touchdown finally put Dallas ahead 27–23 in the fourth quarter.
Houston’s late lead demands another response
Houston went back in front 30–27 with 2:23 remaining after a Woody Marks touchdown run. A third-and-14 pass to Dalton Schultz, followed by his lateral to David Montgomery, had moved the Texans to the Dallas six-yard line on that possession.
Prescott answered with an 11-play, 74-yard drive that included completions of 15 yards to Lamb and 22 to George Pickens. Lamb caught the touchdown pass with 40 seconds left; the Cowboys finished with the 34–30 win.
Lamb’s personal best within a shared effort
The 17 receptions set Lamb’s personal high. They were the second-most in a Cowboys game, behind Jason Witten’s 18 in 2012. Prescott completed 32 of 45 passes for 335 yards, so Lamb accounted for more than half of Dallas’s completed passes.
The receiving total and Williams’s three rushing scores explain different parts of the comeback. Williams finished the possessions that brought Dallas back and delivered its first lead; Lamb finished the answering drive after Houston had taken that lead away.
Dallas reaches 2–2 before a short week
Dallas improved to 2–2, while Houston fell to 0–4. Houston’s offense still produced 347 passing yards from C.J. Stroud and two receiving touchdowns by Nico Collins, but its late lead did not hold.
The Cowboys next host Tampa Bay at AT&T Stadium on Thursday, according to the team’s report. Dallas therefore moves directly into a short turnaround after a game that required both a halftime recovery and a final scoring response.
