NEW ORLEANS — Dallas defensive coordinator Dan Quinn had to step in for Mike McCarthy as acting head coach and enjoyed the sideline view as the unit he normally oversees lifted the Cowboys out of their recent swoon with a slew of big plays.

CeeDee Lamb had 122 yards from scrimmage, Tony Pollard ripped off a 58-yard touchdown run and the Dallas defense produced a drive-stalling sack and three interceptions in the fourth quarter of a 27-17 victory over the New Orleans Saints on Thursday night.

The Cowboys (8-4) intercepted Saints quarterback Taysom Hill four times in all – three times in the final 6:32 of the game, including defensive tackle Carlos Watkins’ pick-6 on a screen pass that made it 27-10 with 2:52 left.

“I finally got to see his emotion and expressions down on the sidelines,” Dallas rookie outside linebacker Micah Parsons said of Quinn, a former Atlanta head coach who normally calls defensive plays from a booth with Dallas. “It was good to see a smile on his face and it was good to see another win on the board.”

McCarthy and five assistants didn’t make the trip because of positive COVID-19 tests.

“I love doing hard things with a group of people and this was one of those moments,” a gratified Quinn said. “We wanted to make sure Mike and all the guys that we missed, that we got their back. Honestly, that was the only thing I was nervous about. I didn’t want to let them down.”

The Saints (5-7) gave the dual-threat Hill his first start this season in hopes he could help New Orleans snap a four-game skid. He was effective in spurts, passing for 264 yards and two touchdowns – and running for 101 yards – while playing through an early injury to the middle finger of his throwing hand.

“He played with a lot of heart, a lot of guts,” Saints coach Sean Payton said.

But Hill‘s turnovers proved too much to overcome as the Saints – winners of the NFC South the previous four seasons – lost a fifth straight game for the first time since 2005, the season before Payton took over in New Orleans.

“It’s very frustrating. It’s unfamiliar territory for us,” Hill said. “This is my fifth year and I haven’t experienced anything like this since I’ve been a Saint.”

Dak Prescott passed for 238 yards and a 1-yard touchdown to Michael Gallup.

Prescott was intercepted by Marshon Lattimore in the middle of the fourth quarter, but the Cowboys canceled out that turnover when Jourdan Lewis hit Hill’s arm as he released the ball and Damontae Kazee intercepted.

That was the first of Dallas‘ three late interceptions. The Saints‘ next drive stalled on a pick by Trevon Diggs, his league-leading ninth. And Watkins’ interception came on the drive after that.

“When the ball was in the air, our guys went and got it,” said Parsons, whose 10th sack of the season also ended a Saints threat early in the fourth quarter. “We tried our best to contain them. I mean, he was getting outside the pocket and we were finding ways to slow him down and getting the ball back.”

Saints receiver Deonte Harris turned a short pass into a late 70-yard TD for the game’s final score.

SLOW STARTS

The Saints have started slowly throughout their skid and this game was no exception as they failed to score in the first quarter for the fifth game in a row.

The Saints‘ first scoring threat came on their second drive, but Brett Maher’s 56-yard field goal attempt drifted wide right.

Dallas broke through on its third possession, highlighted by Prescott’s 41-yard pass over the middle to Amari Cooper and a lateral pass to Lamb that went for 33 yards to the New Orleans 1. Prescott then tossed a fade to the right corner, where Gallup made a leaping, twisting catch over cornerback Bradley Roby and narrowly touched both feet in bounds.

The Saints tied it on Lil’Jordan Humphrey’s 24-yard TD catch early in the second quarter, but never led.

After Greg Zuerlein’s 55-yard field goal put Dallas up 10-7, the Saints threatened late in the second half when they drove to the Dallas 26. But Hill‘s pass toward the left sideline was tipped by receiver Kenny Stills and intercepted at the 5 by Jayron Kearse, who dived to snag the fluttering ball while dragging his toes on the turf before falling out of bounds.

The game remained close into the third quarter, when Pollard gave Dallas a 20-10 advantage by slipping an arm tackle in the backfield and speeding away from everyone else.

INJURIES

Dallas did not report any injuries during the game.

Saints: Hours before the game, the Saints placed defensive end Tanoh Kpassagnon on injured reserve after he’d missed the previous two games with an ankle injury. … Juwan Johnson hurt his neck after making a leaping 27-yard catch near the end of the first quarter.

UP NEXT

Cowboys: Visit Washington on Dec. 12.

Saints: Visit the New York Jets on Dec. 12.

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ARLINGTON, Texas — Hours into Major League Baseball’s first work stoppage in 26 years, Commissioner Rob Manfred and union head Tony Clark presented diametrically opposed views of each side’s negotiating positions that point to a lengthy lockout.

In separate news conferences less than a day into baseball’s ninth work stoppage, Manfred said the union’s proposal for greater free agency and wider salary arbitration would damage small-market teams.

Clark, the first former player to head the union, accused Manfred of “misrepresentations” in his letter to fans explaining the lockout, and said “it would have been beneficial to the process to have spent as much time negotiating in the room as it appeared it was spent on the letter.”

“It’s unnecessary to continue the dialogue,” Clark said of the lockout. “At the first instance in some time of a bumpy water, the recourse was a strategic decision to lock players out.”

The dispute threatens the start of spring training on Feb. 16 and opening day on March 31.

In many ways, after 26 1/2 years of labor peace the sides have reverted to the bitter squabbling that marked eight work stoppages from 1972-95, including a 7 1/2-month strike that wiped out the 1994 World Series.

Owners locked out players at 12:01 a.m. Thursday following the expiration of the sport’s five-year collective bargaining agreement.

“If you play without an agreement, you are vulnerable to a strike at any point in time,” Manfred said. “What happened in 1994 is the MLBPA picked August, when we were most vulnerable because of the proximity of the large revenue dollars associated with the postseason. We wanted to take that option away and try to force the parties to deal with the issues and get an agreement now.”

Players gained salary arbitration in 1974 and free agency two years later, and most of the previous disputes centered on the rise of big salaries caused by both, along with demands, mostly by small- and middle-market owners, to control costs and increase their competitive ability.

Management gained an ever-increasing series of restraints over the last two decades, such as a luxury tax on high payrolls, leading to a decrease in average salary during the latter years of the most recent labor deal.

Now players want more liberalized free agency and arbitration, leading to a confrontation.

“It’s a whole list of topics that they’ve told us they will not negotiate,” said Bruce Meyer, the players’ chief lawyer. “They will not agree, for example, to expand salary arb eligibility. They will not agree to any path for any player to achieve free agency earlier. They will not agree to anything that would allow players to have additional ways to get service time to combat service-time manipulation. They told us on all of those things they will not agree.”

Since 1976, players can become free agents after six seasons of major league service. The players’ association proposed starting with the 2023-24 offseason that it changes to six years or five years and age 30.5, with the age in the second option dropping to 29.5 starting in 2025-26.

Players want arbitration eligibility to decrease to two years of service, its level until the mid-1980s.

Central to the strife is the union’s anger over a larger number of teams in recent seasons jettisoning veterans in favor of rebuilding while accumulating prospects. Teams sometimes conclude rebuilding — the players call it tanking — is a preferred strategy for long-term success, even though it can rankle their fans.

“We feel our proposals would positively affect competitive balance, competitive integrity,” Meyer said. “We’ve all seen in recent years the problem with teams that don’t seem to be trying their hardest to win games or put the best teams on the field.”

In the signing scramble ahead of the lockout, teams committed $1 billion to contracts on Wednesday, including six nine-figure agreements that raised the total to nine in the last month and total spending to $2.5 billion since Oct. 1.

“The fact that this year there seems to be more activity sooner by clubs in free agency than a normal year raises more questions than it answers about all the other years,” Meyer said. “One good week of free agency doesn’t address all the negative trends that we’ve seen.”

MLB would keep existing free-agency provision or change eligibility to age 29.5.

“We already have teams in smaller markets that struggle to compete,” Manfred said. “Shortening the period of time that they control players makes it even harder for them to compete. It’s also bad for fans in those markets. The most negative reaction we have is when a player leaves via free agency. We don’t see that, making it earlier, available earlier, we don’t see that as a positive.”

Clark spoke at the hotel where negotiations broke off and Manfred about 14 miles away at Globe Life Field, home of the Texas Rangers.

“The players’ association, as is their right, made an aggressive set of proposals in May, and they have refused to budge from the core of those proposals,” Manfred said. “Things like a shortened reserve period, a $100 million reduction in revenue sharing and salary arbitration for the whole two-year class are bad for the sport, bad for the fans and bad for competitive balance.”

An agreement by early-to-mid-March is needed for a full season.

“Speculating about drop dead deadlines at this point, not productive,” Manfred said. “So I’m not going to do it.”

Negotiations have made little to no progress since they began last spring. Manfred said a lockout was management’s only tool to speed the process.

“People need pressure sometimes to get to an agreement,” Manfred said. “Candidly, we didn’t feel that sense of pressure from the other side during the course of this week.”

COLLEGE PARK — Angel Reese had a career-high 26 points and 15 rebounds, Ashley Owusu scored 22 and No. 8 Maryland defeated Miami 82-74 on Thursday night.

Reese recorded her fifth double-double of the season as the Terrapins (7-2) extended the nation’s longest home winning streak to 29 games and snapped a two-game slide.

“I was part of our loss the last game, so I feel like I didn’t play my best game and I didn’t contribute everything I could because I was in foul trouble and I feel like I was undisciplined within the team,” Reese said. “Being disciplined tonight, I had only three fouls, which is good for me. I usually have more, but it just being disciplined and learning from that and coming out hungry.”

Maryland took the lead for good with 1:40 remaining when Reese made a layup while getting fouled. She missed the free throw, but Faith Masonius collected the rebound and passed it out to Katie Benzan, who connected on a 3-pointer to make it 77-72.

“That 3 was huge,” coach Brenda Frese said. “It gave us a little bit of breathing room to be able to separate. It was a big play.”

Kelsey Marshall scored 24 points for the Hurricanes (4-3), who have dropped three in a row.

Miami, which had forced at least 20 turnovers in four consecutive games, hassled Maryland into 16 giveaways. But it couldn’t overcome the Terrapins’ considerable size advantage. Maryland outrebounded the Hurricanes 48-22 (including 21 offense rebounds to Miami‘s 15 defensive rebounds) and held a 26-7 advantage in second-chance points.

“Our guards should not lead us in rebounding, but they did,” Miami coach Katie Meier said. “Our bigs were in there, but I thought Maryland was relentless to the offensive glass.”

The strong finish prevented Maryland from suffering its first three-game losing streak since February 2018. The Terps haven’t dropped three consecutive nonconference games since 2002-03, Frese’s first season.

The Terrapins played without Benzan and Masonius because of illnesses last week and lost to top-10 opponents N.C. State and Stanford. Diamond Miller also missed those losses and did not play Thursday. The first team all-Big Ten pick from a year ago sat out her third game in a row and has missed all but two games on the year.

Neither team created meaningful separation until the final minute. Maryland’s 28-21 lead in the middle of the second quarter was the largest for either team before the break, but Miami rallied to forge a 36-36 tie at the half.

BIG PICTURE

Miami: Even in a loss, the Hurricanes had to be pleased to generate some perimeter offense. Miami entered the game shooting 26.9% from 3-point range, but was 9 of 19 (47.4%) from the outside against Maryland. The nine made 3s marked a season high.

Maryland: While the Terrapins still aren’t at full strength, their seven-player rotation was enough to gut out a victory against a persistent Miami team that dropped a two-point decision to likely Big Ten contender Indiana last week.

BRINGING THE FIRE

Maryland committed nine turnovers in the first half and struggled to keep tabs on Miami at the defense end. It led Frese to have a “come-to-Jesus meeting” at halftime after trying to allow her team to sort things out on their own.

“I love the response,” Frese said. “It shouldn’t take your head coach having to fire you up. I’m willing to do it if that’s what’s needed, but it was a terrific response by the players because they could have gone one of two ways. I thought we were getting outworked and outhustled in the first half.”

UP NEXT

Miami returns home for a Sunday date with Tulane.

Maryland begins its Big Ten title defense Sunday at Rutgers.