South Carolina Football: Dallas Cowboys fans want team to turn to Rico Dowdle

South Carolina football fans often like to forget much of the Will Muschamp era. Things didn’t end well when Muschamp was the head coach in Columbia, but if fans can get past the bad memories of 2020 and 2019, the start of Coach Boom’s time in garnet and black was pretty good.

One of the standout players of the early Muschamp years was running back Rico Dowdle.

Dowdle battled injuries at times during his career, but he still finished his career with over 2600 yards and 19 touchdowns despite missing a fair amount of time with those injuries and having talented backs like Ty’Son Williams, Tavien Feaster, and Mon Denson in the backfield with him.

After moving on from the South Carolina football program after his senior year, Dowdle was picked up as an undrafted free agent by the Dallas Cowboys. He was inserted into a crowded backfield that had Ezekiel Elliott and Tony Pollard in the running back room and didn’t see the field much early on in his career.

Now, Dallas Cowboys fans want the former Gamecock to touch the ball more often. With Elliott now in New England and Pollard not performing as well as he did when he was Elliott’s sidekick, Dowdle has emerged as a fan favorite with his tough running style.

Even the media is starting to catch on that there might be more to Rico Dowdle’s game that could benefit the Dallas Cowboys if they give him a chance to play more snaps.

Dowdle has just under 300 yards and 2 touchdowns on the season, so his stats won’t blow anyone away, but he put up 79 yards on 12 touches in his only game with more than 10 touches on the season.

In fact, Dowdle is averaging almost 5 yards every time he touches the football, while Pollard is averaging just over 4 yards per touch. The difference of just under a yard might not seem like much, but if Dowdle were to get the football 10 times in a game, he would (theoretically) get about 10 more yards than Pollard would have gotten.

Maybe the Dallas Cowboys fans are starting to notice something that South Carolina football fans figured out from 2016-2019: when he’s healthy, Rico Dowdle can be special.

Dowdle and the Cowboys are taking on the Washington Commanders at 4:30 (Eastern) on CBS.