New-and-improved Cowboys make amends for last visit to Philadelphia

PHILADELPHIA -- When we last saw the Dallas Cowboys leaving this very same Lincoln Financial Field late last December, they were a battered and humbled group, having put the final, galling touch on one of the worst chemistry experiments in the history of the NFL. It was one last hard knock for the once-celebrated boys of "Hard Knocks,'' and the failure was epic-sized.

But quite a bit has changed for these Cowboys since that 44-6 season-ending, playoff-dream-killing humiliation at the hands of the Eagles, and the Dallas team that showed up here Sunday night seemed bent on proving it to both Philadelphia and the football-watching world. These Cowboys were everything last year's squad was not: Patient and resilient when they had to be. Opportunistic when the game allowed. And both self-less and disciplined enough to out-execute an Eagles team that is far better known for those championship qualities.

Don't go crowning these Cowboys the 2009 NFC East champion just yet, because there's still a half-season to play, and we all know December can be cruel to Jerry Jones' team. But the Cowboys' gritty 20-16 defeat of the Eagles was the best example so far that a new day might indeed be dawning in Dallas. I don't really remember the last time I was impressed with the backbone, chemistry and composure of a Cowboys team, but suffice to say it has been a decade or so.

"This was huge for our team," Dallas tight end Jason Witten said. "I'm so proud of our composure. At 2-2, and taking Kansas City into overtime (in Week 5), a lot of people were wondering what's going on with this team? We just kind of stayed together and stayed true together, and worked hard and got better. To fight back and at the halfway mark be in the [division] lead says a lot about our team."

The Cowboys are all alone in first place in the NFC East as midseason arrives. At 6-2, with a four-game winning streak since that panic-button Week 4 loss at Denver, Dallas is in the driver's seat of the division, a full game ahead of the vanquished Eagles (5-3) and 1½ games better off than the furiously fading Giants (5-4). The Cowboys improved to 3-1 on the road with the win, matching their 3-1 home record at their new $1.15 billion stadium.

While the Cowboys merely evened their record within the NFC East at 1-1, they appear to have plenty of ceiling room left. Their next three opponents are a combined 8-16: at Green Bay (4-4), home against Washington (2-6) and Oakland (2-6). If Dallas takes care of business against those three strugglers, it might just enter December for once with enough momentum at 9-2 to withstand even their annual late-season swoon.

"They all count, and they're all big, but this was a huge win for us because it was against a division opponent on the road, and a team that's going to be in the playoff picture," Dallas linebacker Keith Brooking said. "You don't want to make it bigger than what it was, because we've got to play [the Eagles] again at home, and we've got four more division games left.

"But besides New Orleans and Indy, I don't know how many other teams have won four games in a row this season. The more you pile up these wins, with as talented a team as we have, and the way we're playing, that's a dangerous recipe for us. We've just got to lock and reload every week, and approach it the same as we did this week, and we're going to be just fine."

If you're a Cowboys fan, there are so many reasons to walk away from game feeling completely different about your team than you did the last time it faced Philadelphia.

-- The way Dallas got the one game-changing play it needed at the most opportune time: Miles Austin's 49-yard, fourth-quarter touchdown catch with 8:04 remaining, his only reception of the game, but the most impactful.