Ezekiel Elliott is coming off a game against the New Orleans Saints in which he had a measly 35 rushing yards, the third-lowest total of his career, and a fumble. The 35 rushing yards were the fewest in Zeke's career with more than 15 carries.
The Dallas Cowboys running back is hungry to make up for that poor outing this Sunday against the Green Bay Packers.
"You definitely take it personally, because we didn't expect to go out there and only put up 10 points," Elliott said of the Week 4 loss, via ESPN. "You've got to take it personally, but you've also got to take what you've learned from the game and move on. We're on to a new opponent, a new team this week, and it's a different obstacle, so we've just got to figure out the best way to overcome this one."
Sunday portends a game that Zeke should eat. And eat. And eat. And eat. The running back should get the ball so much his wrist should be sore from doing his "feed me" celebration.
The Packers' run defense has been abysmal through four weeks, allowing 142.3 rushing yards per game, 26th most in the NFL. Worse still, opponents are earning a whopping 5.0 yards per carry, 29th worst in the league.
"Some teams have had some good running games against them, but we've got to go out there and play our football," Elliott said. "I'm not really too focused on them, just focused on us and going out there and getting better as a team and getting a W."
We'd call it a Swiss-cheese run defense, but a block of that holey dairy would seem more solid right now. The Packers' D has been particularly putrid on runs to the left side of the field, allowing 6.2 yards per rush that way -- 2.0 more than runs right -- per Next Gen Stats (second-most in the NFL).
The Cowboys generally dominate running left, but with Tyron Smith out, we'll see how well Zeke can take advantage of that side of the Green Bay run D. Dallas averages 5.3 yards per rush to the left with Smith on the field since 2016 (582 rushes). The average dips to 4.3 yards per rush to the left without Smith over that same timeframe (153 rushes).
Whichever way Zeke runs, it should be a lot Sunday as the Cowboys look to bounce back from their first loss of the season.
