Super Bowl 30 was also Jay Novacek's final game. As you know, we never regained our dominance since.
While many reasons Cowboys never reclaimed dominance after SB 30 (ie rise of GM Jerruh, free agency, injuries/suspension, et al), I wanted to see if possible to statistically show what our offense lost post-Novacek.
Advanced Splits only goes back to 1994, but here are the regular season 3rd down stats for Aikman-to-Novacek and Aikman-to-post Novacek (ie Bjornson & LaFleur). The next line is % of Aikman's 3rd down passes that went to TEs. Aikman's Actual Total 3rd Down stats (includes WR, TE, RB) are in parentheses.
Stats implicate that, on third down, Aikman targeted TE about ~46% less after Novacek. For actual first downs thrown by Aikman, ~64% less of them went to the TE. When Aikman did target TEs, Success Rate (defined by getting 1st down) dropped from 61% to 42%.
Ultimately, post-Novacek, TE targets dropped in half and was significantly less successful even when targeted. Most significant to W-L, though, is that Aikman's 3rd down overall success rate dropped from 47% to 41% which seems to be likely attributed to Novacek's retirement.
| Year | Player | Targets | Completions | 1st Downs | Success Rate | |
| 1994*** | Novacek | 25 | 17 | 16 | 64% | |
| 1994*** | % of Aikman | 23% (109) | 25% (67) | 31% (51) | 47% | |
| 1995 | Novacek | 24 | 16 | 14 | 58% | |
| 1995 | % of Aikman | 21% (116) | 23% (69) | 25% (55) | 47% | |
| 1996*** | Bjornson | 2 | 1 | 1 | 50% | |
| 1996*** | % of Aikman | 1% (149) | 1% (86) | 2% (61) | 41% | |
| 1997 | Bjornson/LaFleur | 23 | 15 | 9 | 39% | |
| 1997 | % of Aikman | 15% (154) | 17% (88) | 15% (64) | 42% | |
| 1998*** | Bjornson/LaFleur | 13 | 7 | 6 | 44% | |
| 1998*** | % of Aikman | 10% (133) | 9% (79) | 11% (52) | 39% | |
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*** Stats extrapolated for 16 games. Aikman played 1994 (14 games), 1996 (15 games), 1998 (11 games), which probably inflates the TE's a little since they didn't miss many games.
