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DaRon Bland speaks on biggest hurdle for Cowboys defense in 2026

"We just gotta execute," he said. "We're still allowing long drives out there. We've gotta get \[off the field\] on third down, man. It's just execution. They were one of the worst \[in the league\] on third down, and they improved their percentage of conversion percentage tonight.

"We're just kind of beating ourselves a little bit on the third down. But, yeah, it really just comes down to execution."

To his point, the Packers converted six of their first six third-down attempts and went 11-for-18 overall, punishing the Cowboys for actually being good on first and second down to force them into third-and-long time and again.

"Yeah, it's about playing all four downs," Bland explained. "That's our kind of our biggest thing right now. We're doing good on first, and second, so we just got to get off on third down. It's correctable, and it's our fundamentals. That's what we've got to get back to: owning our fundamentals, and then just doing, doing our 1/11.

"That's what we all talked about — just having that 1/11 and having that connection on the field."

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