Chase Colston

Like, really big.

No, more like season-defining big.

Or get-home-field-advantage-so-the-ball-doesn’t-slip-out-of-the-quarterback’s-hands-in-the-Seattle-rain big.

This is where we find out how good the Cowboys are. The Packers will come in to Texas Stadium and the class of the NFC will prevail.

Disregard the Patriots game. It means nothing at this point. This game is the turning point. The direction the Cowboys choose to take will show what kind of team to expect in the playoffs.

Two factors will determine how the Cowboys come out: the pass defense (duh) and Terrell Owens.

The media can compare Tony Romo to Brett Favre all day, but Romo is no Favre when it comes to being a pure gunslinger. Favre is more aggressive and is not scared to air it out downfield, and it’s not hard to point out Dallas’ weakest link.

The Cowboys only have one Terence Newman, and he can’t cover Donald Driver and Greg Jennings at the same time. A healthy Anthony Henry would help, but Jacques Reeves and the safeties are going to do their parts.

In Roy Williams’ case, that means staying on the line, stopping the run and hitting Favre in the mouth.

In Owens’ case, he’s having a great season. He’s putting up the numbers and keeping Cowboys fans happy by staying quiet.

But the pessimists are still waiting for something to go wrong and for the “real T.O.” to show up and bash his teammates and whine about not getting the ball. These pessimists are worried about trusting Owens.

Well, this is his biggest chance to earn the trust that is still hanging in the balance.

UNBEATABLE?

The world flipped upside down after the New England Patriots beat the Philadelphia Eagles 31-28 Sunday night.

Now the Patriots are suddenly beatable, as if they were unbeatable before Sunday. It turns out that those guys who are playing in the same league as everyone else really are human and are capable of having a bad game.

Is this team great? Absolutely.

The best ever? Maybe.

Is it unbeatable? Absolutely not.

Half of New England’s success comes from the intimidation factor, or the “Mike Tyson Effect” as I like to call it. Though beatable, teams are so scared going into the matchup they come out beaten and embarrassed.

But as we all saw with Tyson, he wasn’t unbeatable. Buster Douglas wasn’t scared, and neither were the Eagles.

Now if someone else in the NFL follows suit, the Patriots won’t go undefeated.

PREDICTION UPDATE

If you took any of my high school state champion predictions to heart, I’d hate to say I told you so.

Four of my picks — Waco (4A Division II), Royse City (3A Division I), Giddings (3A Division II) and Mart (2A Division II) — are all out of the playoffs, and Waco and Mart were both upset in the first round.

That leaves Odessa Permian (5A Division I), Southlake Carroll (5A Division II), New Braunfels (4A Division I), Tatum (2A Division I), Alto (1A Division I) and Roscoe (1A Division II) as the only predicted teams alive.

Four kisses of death down …