Much will be made of Tony Romo's terrific game against the Eagles and Miles Austin's game-winning TD catch, both of which helped to dispel last year's awful loss in the same stadium to close out the season. But the Cowboys' defense played a huge part in the win, too. An Eagles offense that was scoring 29 points per game coming in was held to 16, and Donovan McNabb, who has one of the lowest interception rates in history, was picked off twice and sacked four times.

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The defense has been on a nice run coming in, with 17 sacks in the five previous games, but the challenge against the Eagles appeared to be a little bit of a different animal. They had a young array of speedy weapons at different spots over the field. DeSean Jackson had been on a nuclear tear of late. LeSean McCoy, even without Brian Westbrook, is a threat to take a ball 40 yards every time. TE Brent Celek is a first-down maker. And rookie Jeremy Maclin is developing very quickly and earning McNabb's attention.

But the Cowboys neutralized those weapons with great pressure and sticky coverage. Jackson was held to two catches. McCoy had a 45-yard screen but only 70 yards on his other 17 touches. Celek had a touchdown but only three grabs. Maclin was targeted by McNabb nine times because of the safety help over Jackson but caught only three of them, and both of McNabb's interceptions were intended for Maclin.

Third downs were huge. The Cowboys picked off the Eagles' first third-down attempt and forced them into several long-yardage situations. Overall, the Eagles were only 4-for-12 on third downs, and they were stopped on a crucial fourth-down play in the fourth quarter that set up the game-winning score to Austin. What allowed that to happen was great defense on first and second downs, and the Cowboys felt very comfortable playing two-deep coverage when it was 3rd-and-long.

The Cowboys' defense also forced Andy Reid to waste two challenges and burn all of his timeouts. Both the third-down pass to McCoy and the McNabb sneak on fourth down were challenged but upheld. So there was a hidden value, too. Reid could not stop the clock, and the Cowboys burned it down to zero.

NY Jay Ratliff was an early standout with two first-half sacks. He forced the Eagles to tandem block him for most of the game. SS Gerald Sensabaugh, having an underrated season, intercepted a pass and wouldn't let Maclin and Jackson get deep to make the one big play that might have changed the face of the game entirely. ILB Keith Brooking (five tackles, sack, pass defended) played another strong game. CB Mike Jenkins (interception, two passes defended) still makes a mistake or two here or there, but he's looking like a player now. And how big was that sack on McNabb by rookie Victor Butler, who has become a fourth-quarter pass rusher? If McNabb breaks that shoestring tackle, he runs 30 yards at least.

It was a tremendous team effort and a great scheme drawn up by Wade Phillips. The Cowboys decided that they were not going to get beat deep, knowing they would just have to be that much more sound against the run and, more importantly, the short and intermediate passes they knew were coming their way.