Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer defends players-only meeting despite Mike Tomlin's criticism

The Dallas Cowboys’ uneven start continued in Week 5, when they fell to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and dropped to 2-3 through five games.

Much of the scrutiny has centered on Dallas’ defense, which has struggled to find consistency during the team’s early-season stretch.

Against that backdrop, the Cowboys held a players-only meeting .

While former Pittsburgh Steelers coach and current NBC Sports NFL analyst Mike Tomlin questioned what players-only meetings could signal for an NFL team, Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer does not view the situation as cause for alarm.

Instead, he sees a players-only meeting as a sign that "everyone’s rowing in the same direction." THE CRAIG CARTON SHOW–UNFILTERED, UNAPOLOGETIC AND UNMISSABLE.

DOWNLOAD HIS DAILY PODCAST NOW! Schottenheimer continued, explaining why he sees value in players-only meetings: "I love it.

I've said from the very beginning, the best teams I've ever been around are led by the locker room.

And my information that I received from some of those guys that called that meeting, it was very productive.

It was very open and honest." After last Thursday's loss to the Bucs, Cowboys linebacker DeMarvion Overshown confirmed reports that the defensive players held a meeting to assess whether they were meeting the team’s standards.

The players went "by bullet point, bullet point," Overshown said, working through the areas where they needed to improve.

During the latest episode of Jason and Travis Kelce’s "New Heights" podcast, Tomlin offered a blunt assessment when asked about NFL players holding meetings without coaches or other staff members.

"I think you’re dead," he said.

MIKE TOMLIN OFFERS BLUNT TAKE ON NFL PLAYERS-ONLY MEETINGS: ‘I THINK YOU’RE DEAD’ Tomlin later clarified that his concern was less about whether a players-only meeting had occurred than about the fact that it became a subject of public discussions.

"If it did occur, I’d like to not hear about it," Tomlin said.