Our Cowboys vs Giants prediction makes this close to a coin flip. Dallas travels to MetLife Stadium on Sunday, September 13 for Sunday Night Football. NBC and Peacock have the 8:20 PM ET kickoff, which closes the opening Sunday of the 2026 NFL season. Squawka Signal’s live read on this game, including where the value sits, is in the block just below. Finally, Signal rates every Week 1 game the same way.
Dallas arrives with the strangest profile on the slate. They threw for 4,527 yards and scored 471 points. Yet they finished 7-9-1, because they conceded 511, more than any team playing this weekend.
The defensive numbers are, moreover, worse than the total suggests. Opponents posted a 109.6 passer rating against Dallas, the weakest figure in this round of fixtures, and the Cowboys intercepted just six passes across the entire season.
Cowboys vs Giants: our editor’s prop
One editorial call to sit alongside the live Signal numbers above.
AT 
Our prop
An editorial call, not a Signal model output. 21+. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.
Cowboys vs Giants: 2025 season form
Dallas finished 7-9-1 and New York 4-13, so neither arrives with momentum. Still, the Cowboys were the more dangerous side going forward. The Cowboys scored 471 points to the Giants’ 381.
| 2025 regular season | Cowboys | Giants |
|---|---|---|
| Record | 7-9-1 | 4-13 |
| Points for | 471 | 381 |
| Points against | 511 | 439 |
| Point differential | -40 | -58 |
| Sacks recorded | 35 | 39 |
| Sacks allowed | 31 | 48 |
| Interceptions made | 6 | 9 |
| Third-down offense | 41.1% | 40.2% |
| Red-zone offense | 56.9% | 47.5% |
| Red zone allowed | 66.7% | 63.2% |
| Opponent passer rating | 109.6 | 94.3 |
The defensive rows explain both records. Dallas conceded 511 points at a 109.6 opponent passer rating with only six interceptions; the Giants conceded 439 and allowed 48 sacks of their own quarterbacks. Notably, New York’s 39 sacks and Brian Burns’s 16 are the one genuine strength on either side.
Cowboys vs Giants injury report and team news
Both sides expect their first-choice quarterbacks. The live Out, Doubtful and Questionable designations appear in the table below, and they update as the official report lands through the week.
Dak Prescott starts for Dallas, with CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens both having cleared 1,000 receiving yards in 2025. KaVontae Turpin works behind them, meanwhile, and Javonte Williams leads the backfield after 1,201 rushing yards.
Jaxson Dart starts for New York. Malik Nabers heads a deep receiving group that also holds Darius Slayton, Darnell Mooney and Odell Beckham Jr., while Najee Harris, Cam Skattebo and Tyrone Tracy Jr. share the carries.
The matchup that decides it: whether anyone can stop anyone
Dallas conceded 511 points in 2025 and allowed a 109.6 opponent passer rating. Both are the worst figures of any team playing this weekend, and they came alongside just six interceptions all season.
Indeed, that is the number worth sitting with. Six takeaways across seventeen games means the Cowboys almost never got off the field early, which is how a team throwing for 4,527 yards still finishes below .500. Therefore Dart should get clean looks.
New York’s own problem, by contrast, is protection. Their line allowed 48 sacks and the offense converted only 47.5% in the red zone. Still, Brian Burns’s 16 sacks give them a way to unsettle Prescott that most teams on this slate cannot match.
Players to watch
- Dak Prescott (DAL, QB): 4,527 passing yards and 31 touchdowns in 2025, the most of any team playing this weekend.
- CeeDee Lamb (DAL, WR): 1,077 receiving yards, working opposite George Pickens’s 1,429.
- Brian Burns (NYG, OLB): 16 sacks last season, second only to Myles Garrett.
- Malik Nabers (NYG, WR): Leads a receiving group that also carries Slayton, Mooney and Beckham.
- Jaxson Dart (NYG, QB): Inherits an offense that converted just 47.5% of its red-zone trips.
How to watch Cowboys vs Giants
The game kicks off at 8:20 PM ET on Sunday, September 13 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford. NBC has the national broadcast, meanwhile, and Peacock carries the stream. Because this is the Sunday night game, there is no regional coverage map to work around.
| Detail | Cowboys vs Giants |
|---|---|
| Date | Sunday, September 13, 2026 |
| Kickoff | 8:20 PM ET / 7:20 PM CT / 6:20 PM MT / 5:20 PM PT |
| Venue | MetLife Stadium, East Rutherford, NJ |
| TV | NBC |
| Live stream | Peacock |
| Week | Week 1, 2026 NFL season |
Cowboys vs Giants prediction and score projection
Our Cowboys vs Giants prediction is a narrow Dallas win, and narrow genuinely means narrow. The Cowboys have the better quarterback and far the better passing game. Yet they conceded more points than anyone else on this slate.
The Giants have a route through Burns. Sixteen sacks against a Dallas line that allowed 31 is the sort of matchup that can flip a game this close, and the Cowboys’ six interceptions all season suggest they will not take the ball back easily.
So we will take the Cowboys to win, 25-24. Which side carries the value, though, is a separate question from who wins, and the live read on that sits in the Signal block.
Signal rates every game on our NFL picks page. Meanwhile the title race is priced through Super Bowl LXI odds, with both conferences on the NFC and AFC Championship pages. Finally, player markets sit with our NFL player props coverage, and kickoff is confirmed on NFL.com.
Cowboys vs Giants FAQ
The Cowboys, narrowly. Dallas scored 471 points in 2025 to the Giants’ 381, though they also conceded 511, more than any team playing this weekend. The live win probability and the current market price both sit in the Signal block on this page.
Spreads move all week, so both the live line and our model’s projected line sit in the Signal block rather than in this answer. As a guide: Dallas finished 7-9-1 and New York 4-13, but Dallas’s points difference was minus 40 against the Giants’ minus 58.
NBC has the national broadcast and Peacock carries the stream. Kickoff is 8:20 PM ET on Sunday, September 13, 2026 from MetLife Stadium. As the Sunday night game there is no regional blackout.
Because of the defense. They conceded 511 points at a 109.6 opponent passer rating, both the worst marks on this weekend’s slate, and intercepted only six passes across the whole season.
Cowboys 25-24. Dallas has the better passing game, but conceding 511 points and taking the ball away six times all season suggests the Giants will stay with them.
21+ | Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER | Signal probabilities and odds approximate at time of writing and subject to change