Cowboys coach McCarthy back at work after surgery. Will he coach vs. Eagles?

Dallas Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy underwent an emergency appendectomy on Wednesday.

And while he was at home on Thursday, he was hardly resting.

After the surgery he was immediately on the phone and on Zoom calls to prepare for Sunday’s showdown against the Philadelphia Eagles for first place in the NFC East.

And the grumpy Cowboys coach was hardly in the mood for well wishes and being treated with kid gloves, just as quarterback Dak Prescott predicted.

This week and this game are too important.

And more important, McCarthy is too important to the process.

As much as Prescott gets praised for his MVP-level play, sparking the Cowboys to six wins in their last seven games, McCarthy is one who has been driving the bus as the offensive play caller.

The Cowboys have the No. 1 ranked scoring offense and Prescott has 21 touchdowns and two interceptions in the last seven games. They have won four straight since a loss to the Eagles on Nov. 5.

So it is natural to question what effect his situation will have on the game and the game plan.

Will he be available on Sunday as expected?

Will he be able to call plays from the sideline?

Offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer, who stood in for McCarthy at his scheduled press conference Thursday, answered in the affirmative on both.

“Like I said, full steam ahead,” Schottenheimer said. “We don’t anticipate anything different. Again, he’s involved in all the things. We’ll have a long conversation again this afternoon. He’s watching the practices and yeah, full steam ahead.”

Schottenheimer talked to McCarthy after his surgery Wednesday and spoke with him Thursday morning.

“Oh yeah. Hey, you can’t have a conversation with Mike without. … He’s going to talk about two things, football or Pittsburgh,” Schottenheimer said. “I don’t know if Pittsburgh came up, but football definitely came up. Had I talked to him long enough — I got off because I had things to do — Pittsburgh would have come up.”

Schottenheimer made it clear that while McCarthy can be gruff and has a temper, he feels good. He appreciates his situation and is thankful he listened to his body.

“We’ve all been there, like in this profession I know I’ve been around coaches, I’ve probably done it myself, right? ‘Ah, I feel off,’ and then you don’t do anything,” he said. “But he’s in good spirits. He’s excited.”

As far as the game and game plan is concerned, Schottenheimer said most of the hard work was done on Monday and Tuesday.

The biggest thing now is the Thursday night meeting with Prescott to decide what he likes best and develop the opening script.

McCarthy will be on the call for that.

“The way we game plan, we do a lot of things early,” Schottenheimer said. “We front load stuff. We get to first and second down, third down, really on Monday and Tuesday, which is great. He’s been very involved. He’s in good spirits. It’s always good when he has a lot of suggestions when you talk to him on the phone. Well, what do you think of this? That’s when I know he’s feeling good.

“We’re going to do the same process. Nothing is going to change. We are full speed ahead.”

Defense looks for signature win:

At times the Cowboys’ defense appears to have it all — a coordinator (Dan Quinn) who has been viewed as a franchise saver, a pass rusher (Micah Parsons) correctly seen as the most disruptive force in the game and now a cornerback (DaRon Bland) who has broken an NFL record despite not being a starter when the season began.

The unit has the stats as a group to state its case — third in total defense (best in the NFC), fourth in points allowed, seventh in sacks, fourth in turnover margin, fourth in takeaways. What it lacks is a signature win against a good team in which the unit is dominant. Or even relevant.

No better time than the present. The Cowboys host the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday night, and nothing less than first place in the NFC East is at stake. Dallas will still need the Eagles to lose another game down the stretch — presumably next week in Seattle — to have a chance to win the tiebreaker or finish first overall, but the Cowboys have no real chance without a win Sunday night as the nation watches. This would seem to be an opportune time for Quinn’s unit to remind us how we viewed this as a defense-first team back in September.