The Los Angeles Rams have been on a bit of a skid in recent weeks, and their fans didn’t turn out at the rate that the team had hoped for in their Week 5 loss to the Dallas Cowboys. At times, it seemed that SoFi Stadium was the Cowboys’ home turf, and head coach Sean McVay was acutely aware of the disadvantage that his squad had given the circumstance.
In his comments to the media after the game, he recounted the experience of playing in a hostile environment in the team’s native market. It is hard enough to win games in the NFL, let alone at home with the opponent’s fans creating a raucous environment at inopportune times.
“It was challenging,” McVay said of the situation on Sunday. “They’ve always been a team that’s traveled well, but we got to give them something to cheer about. Particularly when we’re on offense and we [have] got to be able to play more consistently on special teams.”
Despite the adversity caused by Dallas’ fans, McVay made no excuses for his team’s poor performance in Week 5. They slipped further down in their divisional standings, and solutions to their problems on offense will need to be found in short order to ensure that their season doesn’t get too far out of hand.
With twelve regular season games left to punch their ticket to the playoffs, Los Angeles still has plenty of time to get back on track and give their fans a reason to turn out in droves on Sundays. As the incumbent Super Bowl champions, the Rams have met high expectations with lackluster performance so far in 2022 but could make a major rebound this week against the Carolina Panthers, who fired their head coach Matt Rhule on Monday morning.
It will take a concerted effort on both sides of the ball to get back on pace to make waves in the postseason, but with McVay at the helm, anything is possible.
