Jean-Jacques Taylor

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Players and coaches love to say every NFL game counts the same. No game, they insist, carries any more weight than another.

For the most part, they want you to believe they're all important. Well, that just ain't the case, as you're about to find out Sunday against Atlanta.

This is as close to a swing game as it gets for the Cowboys.

Beat a good team such as the Falcons, and the Cowboys will have their first win this season over a quality opponent. Wins over Tampa Bay, Carolina and Kansas City haven't revealed much about the Cowboys other than they tend to struggle against bad teams.

Still, for all the criticism the Cowboys received for their admittedly ugly win over Kansas City, at least they won – which is more than Philadelphia did Sunday against a putrid Oakland team.

A win over Atlanta means we can finally start to legitimately debate where the Cowboys fit into the NFC as opposed to which receiver they should select in the first round of next April's draft. A loss, and we might as well start the coaching search because there's no way this team is going to the playoffs.

Not realistically.

Nine wins didn't get the Cowboys into the playoffs last year, and it's not going to do the trick this year. Ten is the magic number for those clubs aspiring to be playoff teams.

Lose to the Falcons, and it means the Cowboys will have lost two of three games in Jerry Jones' brand-new $1.2 billion steel palace that, as you might remember, was supposed to inspire the players to perform with peak efficiency.

Two of the next three games are at Green Bay and Philadelphia, tough venues where the Cowboys probably won't be favored. The December schedule is brutal. And the Cowboys would need to win seven of their last 10 to contend for a playoff spot with a host of other teams.

Now, do you understand why this game plays such a pivotal role in defining their season? Yes, it's only one game, but there is a huge difference between 4-2 and 3-3 in the standings.

Besides, the Cowboys are coming off a bye week, so they've had plenty of time to prepare a strategy to slow down tight end Tony Gonzalez, running back Michael Turner and quarterback Matt Ryan. They should be rested, fresh and excited about the opportunity to play again after a troublesome performance against Kansas City that required overtime to beat one of the league's dregs.

They should have Roy Williams and Felix Jones back in the lineup, so the offense should be more explosive.

And, frankly, it's time for the Cowboys to make a move and string some wins together. The players and coaches are tired of hearing it, but this team is 13-12 in its last 25 games and has not won more than three consecutive games.

These Cowboys have yet to win consecutive wins this season. At some point, if the Cowboys want to be taken seriously as contenders in the NFC, they have to put a winning streak together.

Phillips really believes the way the Cowboys beat the Chiefs will galvanize this team. He liked the way the team fought Kansas City and refused to give in even when the opportunity presented itself.

As Keith Brooking walked off the field, he talked about the win being a defining moment in the Cowboys' season. We're about to find out.

"It was an ugly win, and it wasn't good enough," Phillips said with a tinge of sarcasm, "but emotionally we came together as a team and believed in each other, and we won the game."

Again, the problem with the Cowboys isn't talent, because they have enough talent to be a playoff team.

The Cowboys' problem is that they rarely resemble a focused, well-prepared team that plays to its potential.

They must do that to beat Atlanta, and make themselves a factor in the NFC.