Tony Romo was much more than just a bus driver Sunday in St. Louis. Romo used his arm and his feet in several critical situations during the second half as the Dallas Cowboys rallied from a 21-0 deficit to defeat the Rams 34-31.
Romo's only critical mistake came midway through the second quarter when Rams corner Janoris Jenkins jumped Dez Bryant's route and intercepted Romo for a 25-yard touchdown return. St. Louis took a 21-0 lead on the play, but Dallas responded with 20 unanswered points.
Following the interception, Romo settled in and looked like his old self, completing 12-of-15 passes for 172 yards and two touchdowns.
The 34-year-old quarterback clearly played his best game since having December back surgery to repair a herniated disk.
"I felt stronger, felt as if everything was firing, activation sequence, blah, blah, blah, stuff like that," Romo said. "That wasn't necessarily as well as I wanted to probably play the first couple of weeks, but I've played through injury and stuff before. You just kind of manage it and play to the best of your ability."
Romo finished with a 116.8 QB rating, his highest mark since the Week 5 loss to Denver last season when he threw for 506 yards and five touchdowns.
How did Cowboys owner Jerry Jones think his quarterback looked?
"Marked difference," Jones said. "Even though we were not keeping the chains moving, I saw the same thing you saw, his quickness, his ability to escape, his ability to whip around and change directions. And as he would probably tell you, it was firing today, talking about his back and his nerves and things like that."
After experiencing some tightness in his back, Romo sat out Wednesday's practice. With the success he was able to have Sunday, does this mean Romo will sit out every Wednesday for the rest of the season?
"We'll talk about everything with Jason [Garrett] and Scott [Linehan] and figure out what's best," Romo said. "I think more than anything, you have to kind of figure out what's going to give everyone the best opportunity to play at your best.
"If you're just tired or sore, that's just part of football. ... It's mostly just you want to have the functional strength that you might have without as many torqued situations during the week. I think with me, that was the benefit this week and we'll see going forward how that reacts and everything. But it was a good week. We switched up to some more functional strength training, which was good and that helped. So we'll see."
