Last January the Dallas Cowboys punked the Philadelphia Eagles twice in a week, once on the final Sunday of the regular season and again six days later in an NFL Wild Card game. This year, as these NFC East rivals get ready to meet for the first time this season, the Cowboys have been relegated to the role of spoiler. And you can bet they'd love nothing more than to gum up the works of Philly's playoff drive Sunday night at Cowboys Stadium (8:20 pm Eastern, NBC).
Back on Monday
BetJamaica.com opened the Eagles as 3.5-point favorites for Sunday's game over Dallas, with a total of 51. The line later dropped to three, but since has been re-upped to 3.5. And the total now sits at 50.5.
Philadelphia is also moneylined at -200, with the Cowboys getting +170 to pull off the upset.
Dallas, as you might have heard, will not make the playoffs this season. The Cowboys lost seven of their first eight games, saw their starting quarterback go down with a broken shoulder, and fired their head coach. However, since replacing Coach Phillips with interim Coach Garrett, the Pokes have won three of four games, beating the Colts in Indianapolis on Sunday 38-35 in overtime. And they probably should have won the one game they lost, by a field goal on Thanksgiving to New Orleans.
Philly, meanwhile, started 4-3 this season, and went through a couple of changes at QB. But the Eagles have won four of their last five games, beating Houston last Thursday 34-24, and have averaged 34 PPG over the last month.
So at 8-4 Philly leads the NFC East by a head-to-head tiebreaker over the New York Giants, while Dallas sits at 4-8. The Eagles visit the Giants next week.
The Cowboys had been having serious trouble running the ball this season, but over their last four games they're averaging nearly 150 yards on the ground.
On the other side of this matchup Philadelphia is outrushing opponents this season by a 144-102 YPG margin. And so far this season NFL teams that outrush their opponents are 141-51 straight-up and 129-60 (68%) vs. the
BetJamaica.com pointspreads.
Dallas actually beat Philly three times last season, sweeping the regular-season series and winning that Wild Card game.
The Cowboys will be without one of their offensive (and special teams) weapons for the rest of this season, as rookie Dez Bryant suffered a broken ankle Sunday in Indy.
These two teams are a combined 18-6 on the OVER/UNDER this season, as Eagles games have averaged 52 PPG, Dallas games 52.5 PPG.