Mike McCarthy is staying in Dallas.
The Dallas Cowboys are not making a head-coaching change and will keep McCarthy for the 2024 NFL season, team owner Jerry Jones confirmed in a statement Wednesday. ESPN's Adam Schefter was first on the news.
Jones released a statement on the decision shortly after the news broke:
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“I believe this team is very close and capable of achieving our ultimate goals and the best step forward for us will be with Mike McCarthy as our head coach," Jones said in the statement. "...Mike has the highest regular season winning percentage of any head coach in Cowboys history and we will dedicate ourselves, in partnership with him, to translating that into reaching our post season goals."
The full statement can be viewed here:
McCarthy, 60, has one year remaining on his current contract.
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No. 2-seeded Dallas is coming off an embarrassing home playoff exit to the No. 7 Green Bay Packers, who won 48-32 after at one point leading 48-16.
Jones after the game spoke on McCarthy's future with the franchise.
“I haven’t thought one second about it,” Jones told reporters, via ProFootballTalk. “My whole thought process was getting ready for a playoff game here next week. I am amazed to be sitting where we are right now.”
McCarthy enters 2024 with a 42-25 regular-season record in Dallas, having finished 12-5 for three seasons running along with two NFC East titles.
But Dallas has won just one of four playoff games under McCarthy with no NFC Championship Game appearances. The Cowboys are the first team to win 12 games in three straight years but not reach the penultimate stage, a stage they haven't stepped on since 1995.
There was the possibility of Jones moving on from McCarthy and swinging for a bigger fish, such as Bill Belichick now that his time with the New England Patriots is over or Jim Harbaugh now that he's delivered for Michigan. But such scenarios don't seem likely anymore.
If McCarthy staying on board for the final year of his deal sounds familiar, that's because it is. Jones kept former head coach Jason Garrett on board twice during the final year of his contract, with records of 12-4 and 8-8 in those seasons. The latter marked Garrett's last season with the franchise before McCarthy took over in 2020.