Despite a series of recent head coaching changes across the NFL and the number of high-profile coaches still on the market, the Dallas Cowboys have decided to stick with what they already have.
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones announced Wednesday that head coach Mike McCarthy will be returning for the 2024 season, despite an embarrassing first-round playoff loss against his former team last weekend.
"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," Jones said in a statement. "There is great benefit to continuing the team's progress under Mike's leadership."
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The Cowboys hired McCarthy back in 2020 with one goal in mind: help Dallas get over a playoff slump and back to the Super Bowl. In the four years since, they still have not.
The Cowboys' season came to yet another disappointing end Sunday with a 48-32 home playoff loss against the Green Bay Packers. Under McCarthy, that loss made Dallas the first team in NFL history to finish with three straight 12-win seasons and still fail to make the conference championship game.
The Cowboys haven't made it that far in over 25 years.
To make matters worse, Dallas is also the first No. 2 seed to ever be defeated by a No. 7 seed, and the Packers now have more playoff wins (3) at AT&T Stadium than the hometown Cowboys do (2).
McCarthy will enter the 2024 season with no assurances he'll return again in 2025, given it's the final year of his contract. But he remains confident that he can, and will, crack the Cowboys' playoff curse in his fifth season with the team.
"I believe that the direction, the leadership, everything is in place," McCarthy said in a press conference Thursday morning. "And I'm not very comfortable talking about myself, but I came here to win a championship. I didn't come here to get another contract or anything other than that. I came to Dallas to win a world championship, and that's why I'm standing here. Buy into us."
