News and notes from Dolphins’ Christmas Eve win over Cowboys
The Miami Dolphins welcomed the Dallas Cowboys into Hard Rock Stadium on Sunday and earned a playoff-clinching victory in thrilling fashion, as kicker Jason Sanders gave Miami a 22-20 lead as time expired.
While Miami may not have been firing on all cylinders, they did just enough to make sure that they put the narrative of not beating bad teams to bed.
Before we turn the page and prepare for the Week 17 battle with the Baltimore Ravens, let’s talk about some of the interesting tidbits that happened in this one.
Dolphins history
After the win, the Dolphins are 11-4 for the first time since 1990. They’re also 3-1 in December this season.
The last time the Dolphins made the playoffs in back-to-back years was from 1997-2002 when they went to the playoffs five years in a row.
Sunday was Miami’s seventh home victory of the year. The last time they won seven home games in a season was 2002.
The Dolphins have won 19 of their last 22 games at Hard Rock Stadium. It’s the best 22-game stretch in the building’s history (it opened in 1987).
In just 15 games, Mike McDaniel’s 2023 Dolphins team is the fifth in franchise history to top 6,000 yards in a season. His 2002 offense did this as well. McDaniel is the only coach in Dolphins history to do it two years in a row.
Defensive effort
Against the Cowboys, Andrew Van Ginkel was incredible, recording 10 tackles, 1.5 sacks, four quarterback hits, a tackle for loss and a pass defensed.
Van Ginkel, Bradley Chubb, Zach Sieler and Christian Wilkins combined for 10 quarterback hits on Dak Prescott on Sunday.
With four sacks on the day, the Dolphins have now totaled 52 sacks this season with two games remaining. It’s the most sacks a Dolphins defense has recorded in team history.
After Sunday, the Dolphins have a trio of pass-rushers in the top 19 in sacks within the AFC – Chubb has 11, Sieler has 8.5 and Wilkins has eight.
Van Ginkel tied his single-game high in quarterback hits with four against the Cowboys on Sunday. He had one other occurrence with four back in 2021 in a win against the Carolina Panthers. When he has multiple quarterback hits in a game over his career, Miami is 8-3.
Van Ginkel played 82% of the team’s defensive snaps on Sunday. The Dolphins are 11-1 in games that he’s played over 80% of the team’s defensive snaps. They’re 5-0 in 2023.
Chubb now has 11.0 sacks this season and is the first Dolphins player since defensive end Cameron Wake in 2017 to record double-digit sacks in a season.
Van Ginkel is among the very elite. Van Ginkel, Detroit’s Aidan Hutchinson and Pittsburgh’s T.J. Watt are the only players with at least four sacks, five passes defensed, one interception, seven tackles for loss and 10 quarterback hits this season.
The Dolphins have recorded a sack in every single game this season.
Offensive firepower
After his 99 yards against the Cowboys, wide receiver Tyreek Hill leads the NFL with 1,641 receiving yards. He’s 359 yards from hitting 2,000. He needs to average 179.5 over the final two games to be the first player to ever reach this mark.
Raheem Mostert is the NFL’s rushing touchdown leader with 18 and also the fourth-leading running back with 200-plus carries in yards per rush with an average of 4.8. The leaders are (age), Christian McCaffrey (27), Kyren Williams (23), James Cook (24), and then there’s Raheem Mostert at 31 years young.
After a game-winning December drive to beat Dallas, quarterback Tua Tagovailoa leads the AFC in passing yards, average yards per completion and passer rating. He’s second in touchdown passes by one.
Sunday was Tagovailoa’s second game-winning drive of the season and the eighth of his career. He’s now had exactly two game-winning drives in each of his four NFL seasons. To put this to scale, in 17 years, Dan Marino had 47 – an average of 2.7 a season.
Jaylen Waddle became the ninth player in NFL history to begin a career with three straight 1,000-yard receiving seasons thanks to his 50-yard catch against the Cowboys.
Waddle is third in team history with three seasons of 1,000 or more yards – Mark Clayton has five seasons, and Mark Duper has four.
Mostert added to his Dolphins’ single-season touchdown record with his 21st. At 31 years old, he’s the first player in his 30s to rush for 1,000 yards in a season since Washington’s Adrian Peterson rushed for 1,042 yards in 2018 at the age of 33.
Kicking is important too
Jason Sanders made his eighth game-tying or winning fourth-quarter/overtime kick of his career and his first since he made a 50-yarder with 18 seconds remaining of the 2022 regular-season finale against the New York Jets that also sent Miami to the playoffs.
Sunday was just the ninth time in team history that a Dolphins kicker made five field goals in a game.
Sanders’ 57-yard field goal in the first quarter was the longest of his career and the fifth-longest in team history.
Sanders has scored 121 points this season, and as of Monday morning, he’s currently the league’s third-highest-scoring kicker in 2023. The Cowboys’ Brandon Aubrey is first (141), and the Browns’ Dustin Hopkins is second (123).
Sanders is 55-for-56 on point after tries this season which leads the NFL.
