IRVING, Texas -- A stats-eye view of Sunday’s meeting between the Dallas Cowboys and Seattle Seahawks thanks to the fine folks with ESPN Stats & Information:
A winning start: With a win -- surprising as that may seem to many -- against the Seahawks, the Cowboys would have their third 5-1 start to the season since the franchise’s most-recent Super Bowl victory.
It could mean a playoff loss is a lock. The Cowboys started 5-1 in 2007 and finished 13-3. They finished 5-1 in Bill Parcells’ first year in 2003 and finished 10-6. Five times they started 4-2 and made the playoffs in 1998 (10-6), 1999 (8-8) and 2009 (11-5). They missed the playoffs in 2005 (9-7) and 2008 (9-7).
Good running, tough running: DeMarco Murray is averaging 5.2 yards per carry. The Seahawks defense is allowing just 2.6 yards per rush and is the only team to allow fewer than three yards per rush this season.
Murray leads the NFL with 670 rushing yards, but will need a strong effort against the Seahawks to enter the top five of must rushing yards in the first six games of a season since the 1970 NFL/AFL merger.
Handling the pressure: If the Seahawks want to bring pressure against Tony Romo, then they might pay for it.
Romo has seven touchdown passes this season when facing five or more rushers this season, which is the most in the NFL. Eli Manning of the New York Giants is second with six and four others have five.
Romo threw nine touchdown passes when facing five or more pass-rushers all last season.
More efficient: Romo isn’t putting up gaudy stats, but he is being effective.
His 1,260 passing yards are the fewest he has had in the first five games of the season.
A Pro Bowl matchup: Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman lines up only one the left side of the field. The Cowboys have moved Dez Bryant around more this season.
This and that: The Seahawks are 17-1 at home in the regular season since the start of the 2012 season, the best record in the NFL in that span. Quarterback Russell Wilson has started all of those games and, according to Elias Sports Bureau, will look to join former Cowboy Danny White and Matt Ryan as the only quarterbacks in NFL history to win 18 of their first 19 home regular-season starts. … The Cowboys have won four games outside of the NFC East this season after winning three non-division games in 2013. … All four of Murray’s fumbles/fumbles lost have happened in the first quarter, the most fumbles lost by a player in the first quarter since Peyton Hillis, who had four in 2010. The last to have five first-quarter fumbles lost for an entire season was Tiki Barber in 2003.