Texas A&M Aggies' Dan Campbell Intentionally Started Practice Fight With Cowboys

"We were struggling, I think we had a big game against the Giants. Obviously a big rival. It was in New York on national television, it was going to be a night game," Haley said . "... Practice on Wednesday was going bad. You could see Bill Parcells getting heated up. He was not happy with the way anything was going, there was no energy, and I see him call Dan over to the side and say a couple words to him and Dan runs back into the huddle. And Parcells, with his arms crossed like he always did, walked over to me and said, 'Watch this, Todd.' A fight ensued on the next play, and Dan Campbell was in the middle of it.

"As coaches, you gotta do whatever you have to do to get things going in the right direction, and he knew Dan was his man to get in there and stir it up and it worked. All of a sudden practice, everyone's hooting and hollering, excited and good things happened from there."

Haley was with the Cowboys from 2004-06, so this incident had to have been during the 2004 or 2005 seasons. Campbell only played three games in 2004 due to injury and none of them were against the Giants, so using logical deduction, it seems very likely that this incident happened in 2005 when he played all 16 games.

The Cowboys split the season series with the Giants that year, winning 16-13 at home on Oct. 16 before falling 17-10 on the road on Dec. 4.

Twenty years later, Campbell is now arguably the NFL's best coach at motivating his players. Perhaps he took a pointer or two from Parcells, and this incident in particular.