Tom E. Curran • E-mail

IRVING, Texas - Let’s allow Eagles’ guard Shawn Andrews to set the table for Monday night’s Eagles-Cowboys game. 

“This is like the Monday night game of the 2008 season,” Andrews said last week. “I can’t wait until after we get that ‘W’ to go home and watch it again. I’m going to act as if I was not at the game, and I’m going to watch it with my turkey burger and my chips and my water.”

We’ll briefly dissect Shawn’s statement on three levels.

1) This being Week 2, it might be a bit hasty to proclaim this NFC East throwdown a seminal moment in the 2008 season. 

2) He’s willing to climb out on a limb and make a public statement that, yeah, his team will be winning this game. And there’s at least as much self-belief (cockiness, arrogance, bravado) from the Cowboys, which ratchets up the stakes because the fight to not be embarrassed enters the equation.

3) Turkey burger? Chips? Water? Next thing you know, Shawn’ll be cracking open a box of Triscuits. Slow down, big fella.

Philly-Dallas is always an attention-grabber, but this one promises to be a bit more compelling.

Take a look around the NFC. There’s three-fourths of the East, Green Bay and 12 other teams listing toward schlubbiness.

New Orleans? Tampa Bay? Seattle? Minnesota? All flawed, it seems. Not so much with the Iggles and ‘Boys. Even though Philly missed the playoffs in 2007 and the Cowboys got shamed out of them in the divisional round, they both made offseason moves that have given them significant bounce.

The winner of this game gets the early, early, early upper hand in the NFC East, which means inside track to home-field advantage in the playoffs.

Now they go to Dallas to play their final game in decrepit Texas Stadium, where Philly has won the last two times.

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And they go in on a high. Last week, Philly beat the sense out of the Rams, 38-3. Donovan McNabb had 297 yards passing by halftime and whipped three TDs to supposed scrub wide receivers. Meanwhile, Brian Westbrook ran for 91 yards on 19 carries and the Jim Johnson defense did the same thing it’s been doing since midway through last season – wreaking absolute havoc.

This will be the first time Terrell Owens and Tony Romo have to deal with Asante Samuel as part of the Philly defense. And the Eagles will have to deal with Dallas tight end Jason Witten, who had six catches for 96 yards last week against Cleveland. 

How does Philly deal with Witten? Do they blitz Tony Romo with those nasty schemes Johnson dreams up and force him into something like the 13-for-36, three-pick performance he had against Philly last time?

Can Owens put his imprint on the game early with his play, or does he play narcissistic poser? 

On the flip side, how does the always-dicey Dallas secondary respond to the challenge of McNabb? And how does Philly deal with the Dallas 3-4 scheme, which regularly bottles up Westbrook? Can Jon Runyan and Tra Thomas, the Eagles tackles, keep DeMarcus Ware and Greg Ellis off of McNabb’s back? And can McNabb show that he’s not just back from that blown knee suffered late in 2006, but that he’s back!

Answers to most but not all – of these questions will be delivered by midnight. Pass the Triscuits.

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