NFL Power Rankings Week 3: How Much Will The Cowboys Move Up?

Power Rankings are so much more enjoyable when your team won the last game. They still don't mean diddly-squat, but it sure is nice to continue basking in the warm afterglow of the Cowboys' win over the Titans. Unless of course the media consensus doesn't value Sunday's win as much as you would expect.

Seven NFL teams remain undefeated, seven teams are winless. In theory, that means the 1-1 Cowboys could be ranked anywhere between the 8th and 25th spot. Let's see if that logic holds up in today's power rankings summary in which we also look at the NFC East teams.

Note that three of the four NFC East wins to date have come against winless opponents. The Redskins and Eagles ganged up on the hapless Jaguars, the Eagles narrowly beat the now 0-2 Colts, and the Cowboys recorded the only win against a team that has already won a game this season. Will any of that be reflected in this week's power rankings?

Week 3 Rankings (previous rankings in parenthesis)

NFL.com: 21st (28th). "So much for the cursed road blues theory. Maybe that was something reserved for the years of Don Meredith, Craig Morton, Roger Staubach, Danny White, Steve Pelluer, Troy Aikman ... actually, that pretty much covers it. "

ESPN: 22nd (27th): "Sunday was just the eighth time in Jason Garrett's head-coaching career (58 games) that Dallas has run more than passed. The Cowboys are 7-1 in those games."

USA Today: 22nd (28th): "If DeMarco Murray maintains his 2,000-yard rushing pace, Tony Romo and the D will have fewer opportunities to falter. "

Foxsports: 23rd (27th): "The defense came alive, led by Henry Melton and Rolando McClain—both were acquired for pennies on the dollar this offseason. The Cowboys followed the blueprint they set out but often veer away from by running the ball successfully and controlling the clock."

CBSSports (Prisco): 26th (30th): "Running back DeMarco Murray will help them cover up that defense. The formula worked against the Titans and might be their style the rest of the way."

CBSSports (Kirwan): 26th (31st): "Any time the Cowboys can get a red-hot DeMarco Murray on the field and the defense comes to play this team can be competitive."

M-Live: 23rd (26th): "DeMarco Murray is a workhorse, pure and simple, giving the Cowboys good balance on offense."

ProFootballTalk: 23th (27th): "After years of saying they’ll run the ball more, they finally did.  Maybe they should keep doing that."

Newsday.com: 24th (28th). "Nice bounce-back for the Cowboys against the Titans as DeMarco Murray leads the way with 169 rushing yards and a touchdown. "

SB Nation: 25th (26th): No further comments

Shutdown Corner: 26th (28th): "DeMarco Murray has been the best running back in the NFL this young season. And the defense looks far better than anyone expected."

Pro Football Reference: 6th (14th). PFRs Simple Rating System (SRS) takes only two factors into account: strength of schedule and adjusted margin of victory.

Covers.com: 17th (23rd). "Dallas is 1-1 for the fifth time in six years and it has won its third game of the season 11 straight years. 8-18 L26 games following a win. "

Teamrankings.com: 17th (23rd) This site measures the relative strength of all teams using team performance, home/away status, margin of victory and other factors.

Sagarin NFL rankings: 19th (23rd). These are rankings based on W/L record, points differential and schedule strength.

BeatGraphs.com: 19th (- -). BeatGraphs provide rankings that cannot be defeated by a chain of A beat B beat C scenarios. In the end, when all ambiguity is removed, if A has beaten B, A will be ranked above B.

Oddsshark: 22nd (26th). Oddsshark use a multitude of stats to establish an offensive and defensive power ranking, which they then adjust for the strength of schedule.

Numberfire: 23rd (23rd). These rankings are based on expected point differential against a league average team. If the team's rating is 10, they would be expected to win by 10 points against a league-average opponent. This week, the Cowboys would be expected to lose by 1.4 points to such a league-average team.

The table below summarizes the power rankings for the four NFC East teams plus the Cowboys' next opponent. As usual, we'll update the remaining rankings once they're available.

	Wk 3	Wk 2	Wk 3	Wk 2	Wk 3	Wk 2	Wk 3	Wk 2	Week 3
NFL.com	21	28	3	4	30	25	27	30	28
ESPN	22	27	4	4	30	26	25	28	28
USA Today	22	28	5	5	30	27	23	29	28
M-live	23	26	3	4	31	29	24	28	28
Pro Football Talk	23	27	7	11	30	23	22	25	25
Foxsports	23	27	5	5	28	26	27	31	29
Newsday	24	28	4	7	29	29	21	25	27
SBNation	25	26	6	4	29	25	27	29	28
Shutdown Corner	26	28	5	6	30	26	27	32	24
CBSSports.com	26	30	6	8	28	22	25	28	23
Avg.Opinion-based	23.5	27.5	4.8	5.8	29.5	25.8	24.8	28.5	26.8
Pro Football Reference	6	14	26	13	31	25	17	31	23
Team Rankings	17	23	12	12	27	27	28	32	24
Covers.com	17	23	7	13	29	21	25	28	26
Sagarin	19	23	8	7	23	20	21	25	28
Beatgraphs	19	- -	9	- -	24	- -	15	- -	24
Oddsshark	22	26	3	6	26	21	27	31	19
Numberfire	23	23	5	6	28	28	11	25	30
Avg. Stat-based	17.5	22	10	9.5	26.8	23.6	20.5	28.6	24.8
Total	21.0	25.4	6.9	7.1	28.4	25.0	23.0	28.5	26.0