DENVER -- Finding the answers after some losses in the NFL can be difficult. One play here or there and the entire game can shift.

In a 42-17 loss, like the one the Dallas Cowboys suffered Sunday against the Denver Broncos, it’s not difficult to find the answers.

“They just simply outplayed us,” tight end Jason Witten said. “It’s not overly complicated. They played better than we did.”

Ezekiel Elliott, the NFL’s rushing champion in 2016 with 1,631 yards, finished with 8 yards on nine carries. Before Sunday, his lowest yardage total in a game was 51, which came in his first regular-season game. Prior to Sunday, his fewest carries was 12, in Week 16 last year against the Detroit Lions, when he did not get a carry in the fourth quarter with the game over.

“We just couldn’t get any movement on the ball and establish the running game,” Elliott said. “They were built for third down and getting up and rushing the passer, and they did a good job of playing to their strength.”

The Cowboys' strength is the run game. Everything is built off the run. It is the formula the Cowboys used in 2014 when they won the NFC East with DeMarco Murray leading the NFL in rushing. It is the formula they used last year in going 13-3 with Elliott leading the league in rushing.

It’s the formula they used in the 19-3 Week 1 win against the New York Giants. Elliott carried 24 times for 104 yards. Dak Prescott was efficient. They converted 8 of 15 third-down opportunities. The Cowboys held the ball for 34 minutes, 14 seconds.

The Cowboys got away from their formula on Sunday before the Broncos took control of the game. On the first 15 plays, they called 11 passes, including a Prescott scramble.

Against the Broncos, the Cowboys had the same amount of first downs in the game (16) that they had against the Giants in the first half. They had three more yards in Sunday’s game than they had in the first half against New York.

The Cowboys converted just 3 of 14 third-down tries Sunday.

“If you do not stay on the field and give yourself opportunities to score points, the game can get a little bit lopsided,” coach Jason Garrett said. “They made some big plays in the game, but more than anything else, they were able to sustain drives and we were not.”

Prescott threw 50 passes, a career high. He completed 30 for 238 yards and had touchdown passes to Dez Bryant and Witten, but he was also picked off twice and could have been picked off two more times if not for Bryant turning into a defensive back. Prescott’s second interception was returned 103 yards by Aqib Talib for a touchdown with 53 seconds to play to deliver the third-worst loss of the Garrett era.

Because of how the Broncos were loading up to stop Elliott, the Cowboys knew they needed to hit big plays in the passing game. It never happened. Talib and Chris Harris Jr. bottled up Bryant down the field and Cole Beasley underneath.

“If I make more plays we give ourselves a chance to win that game,” Prescott said. “I simply didn’t make the plays.”

Prescott needs to play better, but it goes back to the formula.

In the first two games, he has thrown 89 passes. The most passes he had in a two-game stretch as a rookie was 75, which also came in the first two games of the season. In the final 14 games of the 2016 season, the highest two-game total was 73.

“Obviously, we want to be a balanced team,” Garrett said. “That’s who we’ve been. Be physical, control the line of scrimmage, control the tempo of the game. We have been able to do that on a consistent basis here the last year, but obviously we were not able to do that [Sunday].”

Owner and general manager Jerry Jones never thought his vaunted offensive line with three All-Pros, in Tyron Smith, Travis Frederick and Zack Martin, could be so overwhelmed by a defense.

“I don’t feel like that was us,” Prescott said. “We didn't go out there and execute the way we normally do. It was a good defense we played, and I give them all the credit. They did a good job of matching us up and throwing everything they did at us, but I think for the most part we weren’t ourselves.”

It certainly wasn’t the Cowboys’ formula for success.