By STEPHEN HAWKINS AP Sports Writer
SAN ANTONIO (AP)—The Dallas Cowboys are going home after two weeks in the Alamodome.
They know they are still far from finished in training camp.
“It’s a transition,” defensive end Marcus Spears said. “I don’t think any of us in our right mind think that this is the end of camp. We don’t break camp until late August. … We didn’t have a lot of time to get together during the offseason, so there’s still a lot of work left to be done.”
Coach Jason Garrett put his team through a walkthrough Wednesday morning before breaking the first part of camp and returning to North Texas. Dallas plays Denver in its preseason opener Thursday night at Cowboys Stadium.
The Cowboys had 13 days of practice while in San Antonio.
“It’s been good. I think we’ve accomplished a lot,” tight end Jason Witten said. “I think we’ve taken a mindset when it could’ve been a lot of distractions over the last two weeks because the season happened quick. Guys came here ready to work.”
Especially on defense, with new coordinator Rob Ryan installing his scheme without the benefit of any offseason workouts or meetings because of the 4 1/2-month NFL lockout that didn’t get settled until it was time to go to camp.
The preseason game will be quarterback Tony Romo’s first action against a team other than his own since Oct. 25, when he suffered a broken collarbone against the New York Giants.
Romo organized and ran offseason workouts with players during the lockout in the aftermath of the team’s disappointing 6-10 season. He has looked sharp throughout camp.
“He’s done a lot. … I think experiencing what we all did, there’s a mindset of, `Hey, this window is now and I’ve got to take advantage of this opportunity.”’ Witten said, one of Romo’s best friends since they were rookies together in 2003. “He did it in the lockout and he continued to do it in the start of preseason of not only what the expectations are going to be, but really the clear communication of here’s how we’re going to go about it day in and day out.”
After playing Denver, the Cowboys won’t practice Friday, but resume training camp workouts Saturday at Cowboys Stadium.
Players will be housed at a hotel near the stadium for two weeks, remaining in camp mode at home until after their third preseason game Aug. 27 at Minnesota. There will also be some combined workouts with the San Diego Chargers, who play the Cowboys on Aug. 21.
The Cowboys likely will work outside a couple of days at their Valley Ranch practice facility, but most of the work will be done inside since the Dallas-Fort Worth area is nearing a record streak of consecutive 100-degree days - almost six weeks in a row already.
It is uncertain if the Cowboys will return to the Alamodome for camp in the future since this was the end of a five-year agreement.
Even though camp is far from done, it is more condensed than last year when the Cowboys had five preseason games and traveled about 6,500 miles. There were two-week camps in San Antonio and Oxnard, Calif., split by a trip to Canton, Ohio, for the Hall of Fame game.
Despite only two weeks of camp after no organized offseason workouts, Garrett doesn’t expect much difference from how teams handled preseason openers in the past.
“You try to get a chance to evaluate as many players as you can. … The preseason games allow you to evaluate the players better than any other situation,” Garrett said. “Also, we’re trying to get our team ready. The first preseason game is typically going to be a fewer number of reps for the starting guys, but you do want them acclimated to playing football, so we’ll take that approach.”
On defense, Ryan is also more interested in evaluating the players than his scheme.
Ryan took over a defense that gave up a franchise-worst 436 points last season after allowing an NFC-low 250 points the previous year with pretty much the same players. The new coordinator said the group is “pretty solid” on the base defense and that players are starting to grasp the communication it takes to run the multiple scheme.
“That’s still a work in progress,” Ryan said. “We’re evaluating players and going to make sure you keep the right players to go forward. To be honest with you, I remember every single game that I ever coached in the NFL, the real ones. Not the preseason, I don’t remember one of them. … I remember players, how they make the team, and how they make the team, they show up, they do a great job in preseason.”
Pro Bowl linebacker DeMarcus Ware said the defenders are ready to take what they’ve been learning into a game. He knows they are just getting a glimpse of what is to come under Ryan.
“With Rob Ryan’s defense, it’s a work in progress the whole season,” Ware said. “With that multiplicity of his defense, it’s always changing, so everything is always on the fly and going.”
