2022 NFL coaching news: The Dallas Cowboys will face a couple of old friends next season

The coaching carousel spins round and round in the NFL.

All told there have been nine NFL teams looking for new head coaches this offseason, that is good for over a quarter over the entire league. Going through the process of finding a new head coach is arduous and at times frustrating. It was only two years ago that the Dallas Cowboys had one of the shortest runs ever at interviewing candidates before settling on Mike McCarthy. This season all of the teams have taken their time going about it.

While there are going to be nine teams with new leadership this season, just over half of them pertain to the Cowboys next season. With the 2022 opponents were officially set when the regular season ended (you can see them right here) we know which units will have new head coaches and 80% of them have found what they believe to be the right one.

The Dallas Cowboys will face a couple of old friends next season

Thursday night brought the news that the Jacksonville Jaguars will be hiring Doug Pederson to be their new head coach. Jacksonville is coming off of having Urban Meyer lead them for less than a full season and was in great need of serious stability. As a former Super Bowl winner Pederson should bring that.

It was with the Philadelphia Eagles that Pederson won it all which means the Cowboys know him well. Dallas squared off against Pederson’s Eagles a total of 10 times (twice under Mike McCarthy, one of those games with Ben DiNucci at quarterback) and holds a 6-4 record against him.

Pederson isn’t the only person whom the Cowboys know well that they will be facing in 2022. Former Cowboys staffer Matt Eberflus is now the head coach of the Chicago Bears and there is some speculation that Rich Bisaccia could even become his special teams coordinator.

New Head Coaches the Dallas Cowboys will face in 2022:

• Chicago Bears, Matt Eberflus
• Jacksonville Jaguars, Doug Pederson
• New York Giants, Brian Daboll (twice obviously)
• Minnesota Vikings, Kevin O’Connell (still technically not official)
• Houston Texans, TBD (the three finalists are reportedly Brian Flores, Jonathan Gannon, and Josh McCown)

Of Dallas’ opponents next season that made a coaching change this offseason, only the Texans have yet to find a replacement. The Vikings are expected to hire Los Angeles Rams offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell; however, that cannot become official until after the Super Bowl as the Rams are in it.

If the Texans do hire Jonathan Gannon then that will be another coach who the Cowboys also know, albeit in a looser sense. Gannon served as the Philadelphia Eagles defensive coordinator this past season and the Cowboys had their way with them in the two games they played (although the second was not exactly completely authentic).