(My Sportsbook) - Bill Parcells has enjoyed success everywhere he's coached in the NFL. He led the New York Giants to their first two Super Bowl titles, guided the New England Patriots to a Super Bowl appearance, and righted the ship with the New York Jets en route to a surprising run to the conference title game.

Parcells' players are fiercely loyal. There are many stories about players ready to quit football because of harsh treatment during training camp, only to see those same players ready to run through a wall for their coach in December.

The Big Tuna has also schooled more head-coaching talent than just about anyone else around these days. Bill Belichick and Tom Coughlin were Parcells' assistants with the Giants and went on to successful head-coaching careers. You'll hear the names of Maurice Carthon, Charlie Weis and Romeo Crennel this offseason when teams are looking to fill vacancies. They'll be hot candidates thanks to their apprenticeships under Parcells.

Great coaching will usually get mediocre talent over the hump in the NFL. In 2003, the NFL's talent pool is evenly spread thanks to free agency. Twenty years after Parcells became an NFL head coach, however, the same tactics he used in the early 1980s still work today.

So it shouldn't be a surprise that Parcells has turned around the Dallas Cowboys' fortunes in just one year. Jerry Jones' pride and joy suffered through three straight 5-11 seasons before Parcells' hiring. The Cowboys had not participated in the postseason since 1999, but that will change this year.

The Cowboys locked up a playoff berth in Week 16 with a 19-3 victory over Parcells' former employer, the New York Giants.

"I'm obviously pleased to get my team in the tournament," Parcells stated. "But the players deserve most of the credit. There are some things we need to do to improve if we are going to get anywhere in the playoffs. We're not great, but we are improving. You have to earn your way into the playoffs. You have to beat people to get in and we did enough of that to get in."

Jones had high expectations when he doled out a small fortune to retain Parcells' coaching services. But even the eccentric owner was surprised with the immediate impact made by his new coach.

"I have been slow on the trigger all year getting over enthused," Jones said. "I was standing there on the sideline with a couple of our people and I said, 'Now we're down to a minute [left in the game], do you think it's going to be overdoing it if I say we're going to the playoffs?'"

Andy Reid, Mike Tice, John Fox, Belichick, Brian Billick, Marvin Lewis, Tony Dungy and Dick Vermeil all deserve strong consideration for Coach of the Year honors. However, the coach most worthy of the award is Parcells.

Look at it this way: Parcells is 10-5 with a roster that is mostly Dave Campo's. He hasn't had the time to weed out the roster and fill it up with "his" guys. No coach had a more undesirable quarterback situation than the one Parcells faced in the preseason deciding between Quincy Carter and Chad Hutchinson.

The results are more amazing considering Parcells is working wonders without a star running back. The Eagles and Vikings each have three backs better than any one Parcells has. Carolina is in great shape with Stephen Davis and DeShaun Foster. The Rams have Marshall Faulk, Shaun Alexander is a star in Seattle, and Ahman Green is one of the best all-purpose backs in the league for Green Bay.

No such talent for Parcells.

"I think it's evident our team has got holes in it that have been well documented," Jones said. "For Bill to take this young staff that he's got and coach around those challenges that we've got, that's real impressive."

Selling success has always been as important to Parcells as achieving it. When asked in the offseason about pursuing free-agent quarterbacks to fill the void, Tuna responded, "I'm not interested in going 8-8 this year."

Parcells wasn't about to waste valuable salary-cap space on a veteran signal- caller simply to improve his short-term success. In the end, though, he won out because he didn't mortgage the future and still made it to the playoffs in Year One.

So is this Parcells' greatest coaching job ever? Turning the Jets around in 1999 was a monumental feat and getting the Patriots back on track in the early 1990s was a landmark effort. The Giants hadn't made a mark in the modern era until Parcells spearheaded the Super Bowl run in 1986. The Big Tuna scoffed at the notion that this is his crowning achievement.

"I don't really know about all of that," Parcells said. "It doesn't matter. The game is different now. I think the league is set up where you can get things going a little faster if you get the right pieces in place, you can make some improvements. But I didn't come here to do just that. I told [the players] the first day I met them, 'Get your expectations up, because that's where mine are.'"

By all standards, the Cowboys far surpassed expectations this season. The most accurate observers penned Dallas in for a 7-9 or 8-8 season, at best. The chance to win 11 games is simply amazing.

"We've had this losing culture around us," said veteran safety Darren Woodson. "I always felt that if we were guided in the right direction, we'd do OK. It blows my mind how quick Parcells and his staff have really come in here and changed the entire atmosphere on both sides of the ball."

Make no mistake: the Cowboys have holes just like every other playoff team. But they have Parcells, and no other team can make that claim. It's amazing how far great coaching can take a team. Dallas is in the tournament, and now anything can happen, especially with Parcells at the controls.