They have played each other with both a Super Bowl and a playoff spot at stake.

There were the "Bounty Bowl," Emmitt Smith's getting stuffed, Eagles fans cheering for a motionless Michael Irvin, and Terrell Owens stoking controversy for each side.

The Dallas Cowboys and the Eagles have lined up against each other 99 times, in games that have forged one of the most heated rivalries in the NFL. Somehow it seems fitting that the 100th meeting would have something significant on the line.

Win tonight in Philadelphia and the Cowboys (5-2) are alone atop the NFC East. Knock off the Cowboys and the Eagles (5-2) move into first as the only NFC East team unbeaten in the division.

Last season's finale turned into a do-or-die game for the final NFC wild-card spot, and the Eagles thumped the Cowboys, 44-6, to earn the right to play in the postseason - and eventually reached the NFC title game.

The Cowboys left Lincoln Financial Field in shambles.

They return on a three-game winning streak and playing their best football of the season.

The Cowboys haven't forgotten how they were thoroughly dominated in the second series game last year, and - though it is only the halfway point of the season - wresting the division lead from the Eagles would help put that unpleasant memory behind them.

"We're going to watch it on tape; we're going to correct the things we didn't do well and come up with a way to attack these guys," Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo said. "We're going to go out there and be a better football team than we were that played that day.

"I don't know about the rest of the stuff that people use as motivation. There's motivation in the sense that it is an important game."

Romo has thrown eight touchdown passes without an interception over the last three games, and has put aside Roy Williams' grumbling to find a favorite target in wide receiver Miles Austin.

Austin has 21 catches for 482 yards and five touchdowns during the winning streak. Oh, and those games have represented his first three NFL starts.

"He's been waiting for his opportunity, and when it came along, he's done some really good things," Romo said.