Thirty years ago today, the Dallas Cowboys ended the Green Bay Packers’ season with a 38–27 win in the NFC Championship Game. It marked the third straight year Green Bay’s run stopped in Dallas, and at the time, there wasn’t much mystery about why. That Cowboys team was simply on another level. Former Packers quarterback Brett Favre put it best, summing it up with three words.

“Really, really good,” he wrote on X, talking about Barry Switzer’s 1995 Cowboys team.

Dallas was already loaded with the likes of Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith, and Michael Irvin on offense. Then, before the 1995 season, they went out and added Deion Sanders to a defense that was already tough to deal with. Sanders had just been named Defensive Player of the Year with San Francisco. They were the team to beat.

They’d already handled Green Bay once during the regular season. The Packers were still finding their footing with a young Favre under center and were 3–1 through five weeks, but Dallas didn’t exactly ease them into things in Week 6. The Cowboys built a 31–10 lead in the fourth quarter and then survived a late Favre rally to win 34–24.

Even so, the season felt different for Green Bay. Favre had taken a real step forward, and the Packers were no longer just hanging around. The 1995 season was their 75th in the NFL, 77th overall, and they finished 11–5, winning the NFC Central for the first time since 1982. It felt like something was finally turning.

They backed it up in the playoffs, knocking off Atlanta in the wild-card round and then beating San Francisco to reach the conference championship. Waiting for them once again were the Cowboys.

Dallas jumped out early. Aikman tossed a pair of short touchdown passes, and the Cowboys were up 14–3 before Green Bay really settled in. Favre responded, hitting two long touchdown throws to push the Packers ahead 17–14. Dallas answered again, taking a 24–17 lead into halftime.

The third quarter belonged to Green Bay. They controlled the pace and pulled ahead 27–24 heading into the final period. For a moment, it looked like they might finally overcome the Dallas curse. Then, Cowboys running back Emmitt Smith came in and took over.

Smith ran for 150 yards on the day and scored twice in the fourth quarter, putting the game out of reach. The Cowboys’ defensive front pressured Favre all afternoon, sacking him four times, including two straight up the middle by Tony Tolbert. They picked him off twice, while Aikman played clean football. Final score: 38–27.

Dallas went on to beat Pittsburgh 27–17 in the Super Bowl, cementing their place as the league’s best team. Losing to that group wasn’t something to be embarrassed about. Still, for Green Bay, the sting lingered. It was the third straight year the Cowboys had kicked them out.

Brett Favre’s Packers didn’t have an answer for the Cowboys

The Cowboys were never exactly kind to Brett Favre. Dallas ended Green Bay’s seasons in 1993, 1994, and 1995, all in playoff games played in Dallas, and Favre finished his Packers career with a 2–9 record against them. (He did manage to go 2–0 against the Cowboys later, during his two seasons with the Minnesota Vikings.)

The losses piled up. In the 1993 divisional round, the Packers fell 27–17. A year later, it was worse, a 35–9 defeat in 1994. Then came the 1995 NFC Championship Game, the one that still lingers. It felt like an annual ritual: Green Bay would get close, run into Dallas in January, and walk off on the wrong side of it.

“When we lost in Dallas — it seemed like we lost there every year for a long time,” Brett Favre said. “We were in old Cowboy Stadium. It was a tough loss, one of those that we almost won, and Ron came over [and] said, ‘We’re going to get these guys,’” he added, reflecting on the 1995 defeat.

Top Stories

Jerry Jones Announces Retirement Plans as Dallas Cowboys Owner Makes Triple Decision on Coaching Hiring

Ravens Owner Steve Bisciotti Announces Plans to Sell Franchise and Explains John Harbaugh’s Firing

Mike Tomlin Receives New Job Offer as Steelers Make Final Decision on Firing HC After Aaron Rodgers’ Fury – Report

Ben Roethlisberger Doesn’t Hold Back in Statement on Mike Tomlin After Calling for Steelers to Fire Him

Browns Legend Bernie Kosar Announces Update From Hospital After Health Complications

“But to me, I didn’t really want to play Dallas again. I did, but I didn’t,” Favre said. “We just kind of got beat up, beat up, beat up [by them] every year. But we were so close, and we were hungry.”

As frustrating as those losses were, they mattered. The 1995 season, painful ending and all, turned out to be a turning point for the Packers and Favre himself. It was his breakthrough year.

That year, he threw a league-leading 38 touchdown passes. His 63 percent completion rate ranked sixth, and his 7.7 yards per attempt were second among quarterbacks. His interception rate sat at just 2.3 percent, placing him among the best in avoiding mistakes. It was the season he won the first of his three straight MVP awards.

The Super Bowl finally came home next year. In 1996, Favre led Green Bay to the Lombardi. They didn’t have to go through Dallas that time, beating San Francisco and Carolina before taking down New England for the title. But that run marked the beginning of sustained success.

The Packers would go on to win the Lombardi Trophy in 1996, return in 1997, and lift it once more in 2010. Looking back, it’s fair to say those January losses in Dallas, as painful as they were, helped build the foundation for what came next.