Cowboys stars want Mike McCarthy back as coach. Owner Jerry Jones has to make that decision

FRISCO, Texas (AP) — The Dallas Cowboys are fully committed to Dak Prescott, and their franchise quarterback wants Mike McCarthy back as the coach.

So do standout receiver CeeDee Lamb and star edge rusher Micah Parsons.

Team owner Jerry Jones, at least publicly, hasn't been as clear about his plans with McCarthy's contract set to expire after completing his fifth season. They likely will be talking later this week about what is next.

Jones spoke to reporters for more than 45 minutes after the Cowboys ended their 7-10 season with a last-second loss to playoff-bound Washington, saying he didn't know if he was even considering making a coaching change and talking about McCarthy being one of the league's best coaches. But the owner never provided any certainty that the coach would remain with the team.

“I’m not trying in any way to play a guessing game here with anybody,” Jones said. “We’ve got some work to do, and we need to do some things differently, and we can, and that’s usually the case."

Dallas has now gone 29 seasons since the last of its five Super Bowl titles. The Cowboys haven't made it past the divisional round of the NFC playoffs since that 1995 season, including after three consecutive 12-5 regular seasons under McCarthy.

Prescott, after agreeing to a record $240 million, four-year contract right before the season opener, missed the final nine games with a torn hamstring. Lamb, perennial All-Pro guard Zack Martin, cornerback Trevon Diggs and rushing defender DeMarcus Lawrence also finished the season on injured reserve.

The big question after a season plagued by injuries to so many Pro Bowl-caliber players is if the Cowboys can get back to where they were in the previous three years.

“This is the lowest of the lows, I would say. And if you give myself another opportunity, you give this is locker room another opportunity and attack this thing in the right way, I promise you will be a playoff-contending team this year,” Parsons said. “I know the challenges that we face and how we can still overcome those things if we are still in it together. So I’m glad I went through this this year. You know, it is humbling, you know, to be reground, reset.”

McCarthy will almost certainly have other options if he doesn't stay in Dallas, but said he and the Cowboys have a lot invested in each other and that there was no question in his mind that he was in position to move forward with Jones. He is 49-35 with the Cowboys, and has a 174-112-2 record in 18 seasons overall as an NFL coach, the first 13 with Green Bay and with a Super Bowl win, though that was 14 years ago at AT&T Stadium.

“I’ll just be clear. I’m a winner. I know how to win. I’ve won a championship. I won a championship in this building," McCarthy said after the season-ending 23-19 loss to the Commanders, who scored the winning touchdown with 3 seconds left. “We'll see where it goes.”

Parsons, the first player since Reggie White in 1982 with at least 12 sacks in each of his first four seasons, is next in line after Prescott and Lamb for a big contract. Lamb got a $136 million, four-year deal in August after a month-long holdout before the final season of his rookie contract.

With Parsons now heading into the final season of his rookie contract, the Penn State standout said he hopes to have a new deal in place as soon as possible. But he has said that he doesn't intend on holding out.

Even though he missed four games this season with a high ankle sprain, Parsons finished with 12 sacks after 2 1/2 in the last game. He had two on the opening drive.

Brandon Aubrey kicked four field goals in the finale, giving him an franchise-record 40. He is only the fifth kicker in NFL history with at least 40 field goals, joining Chris Boswell (41) this season, and behind David Akers' record 44 in 2011.

None of Aubrey's kicks Sunday was from 50 yards, but his 14 this season were an NFL record.

After 36 field goals as a rookie last season, Aubrey is the only NFL kicker to make at least 35 field goals in each of his first two seasons.

McCarthy isn't the only Cowboys coach on an expiring contract. His entire staff of assistants was signed only through this season. That includes offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer, defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer and special teams coordinator John Fassel.

The decision on McCarthy's future has to be determined first of all before the Cowboys can really move forward in the offseason.

After that comes the recovery of the players who were injured this season, including Prescott, right guard Martin and Diggs, the cornerback who has had consecutive injury-filled seasons.

Martin, a 2014 first-round draft pick and seven-time All-Pro pick, had season-ending ankle surgery in December. The decision by the 34-year-old on whether to come back for a 12th NFL season could determine how much more flux there will be for the offensive line.

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Dallas Cowboys wide receiver CeeDee Lamb reacts on the sideline prior to an NFL football game against the Washington Commanders, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)

Dallas Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy walks on the field following an NFL football game against the Washington Commanders, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. The Commanders won 23-19. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)

Washington Commanders cornerback Mike Sainristil, right, is pushed out of bounds by Dallas Cowboys linebacker Micah Parsons during the second half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Josh McSwain)

Dallas Cowboys linebacker Micah Parsons reacts after a sack against the Washington Commanders during the first half of an NFL football game, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Josh McSwain)

Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott stands on the field prior to an NFL football game against the Washington Commanders, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)

Dallas Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy talks to reporters following an NFL football game against the Washington Commanders, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Arlington, Texas. The Commanders won 23-19. (AP Photo/Gareth Patterson)

President-elect Donald Trump said Tuesday that he would move to try to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America,” a name he said has a “beautiful ring to it.”

It's his latest suggestion to redraw the map of the Western Hemisphere. Trump has repeatedly referred to Canada as the “51st State,” demanded that Denmark consider ceding Greenland, and called for Panama to return the Panama Canal.

Here's a look at his comment and what goes into a name.

Since his first run for the White House in 2016, Trump has repeatedly clashed with Mexico over a number of issues, including border security and the imposition of tariffs on imported goods. He vowed then to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and make Mexico pay for it. The U.S. ultimately constructed or refurbished about 450 miles of wall during his first term.

The Gulf of Mexico is often referred to as the United States' “Third Coast” due to its coastline across five southeastern states. Mexicans use a Spanish version of the same name for the gulf: “El Golfo de México.”

Americans and Mexicans diverge on what to call another key body of water, the river that forms the border between Texas and the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas. Americans call it the Rio Grande; Mexicans call it the Rio Bravo.

Maybe, but it's not a unilateral decision, and other countries don't have to go along.

The International Hydrographic Organization — of which both the United States and Mexico are members — works to ensure all the world’s seas, oceans and navigable waters are surveyed and charted uniformly, and also names some of them. There are instances where countries refer to the same body of water or landmark by different names in their own documentation.

It can be easier when a landmark or body of water is within a country's boundaries. In 2015, then-President Barack Obama approved an order from the Department of Interior to rename Mount McKinley — the highest peak in North America — to Denali, a move that Trump has also said he wants to reverse.

Just after Trump's comments on Tuesday, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia said during an interview with podcaster Benny Johnson that she would direct her staff to draft legislation to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico, a move she said would take care of funding for new maps and administrative policy materials throughout the federal government.

The body of water has been depicted with that name for more than four centuries, an original determination believed to have been taken from a Native American city of “Mexico.”

Yes. In 2012, a member of the Mississippi Legislature proposed a bill to rename portions of the gulf that touch that state's beaches “Gulf of America,” a move the bill author later referred to as a “joke.” That bill, which was referred to a committee, did not pass.

Two years earlier, comedian Stephen Colbert had joked on his show that, following the massive Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, it should be renamed “Gulf of America” because, "We broke it, we bought it.”

There's a long-running dispute over the name of the Sea of Japan among Japan, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, with South Korea arguing that the current name wasn't commonly used until Korea was under Japanese rule. At an International Hydrographic Organization meeting in 2020, member states agreed on a plan to replace names with numerical identifiers and develop a new digital standard for modern geographic information systems.

The Persian Gulf has been widely known by that name since the 16th century, although usage of “Gulf” and “Arabian Gulf” is dominant in many countries in the Middle East. The government of Iran threatened to sue Google in 2012 over the company's decision not to label the body of water at all on its maps.

There have been other conversations about bodies of water, including from Trump’s 2016 opponent. According to materials revealed by WikiLeaks in a hack of her campaign chairman’s personal account, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2013 told an audience that, by China’s logic that it claimed nearly the entirety of the South China Sea, then the U.S. after World War II could have labeled the Pacific Ocean the “American Sea.”

Kinnard reported from Chapin, South Carolina, and can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP.

President-elect Donald Trump walks from the podium after a news conference at Mar-a-Lago, Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025, in Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)