The road warriors are headed to the frozen tundra to play for a spot in Super Bowl XLII.

The Giants, playing with an injury-ravaged defensive backfield and against the NFC’s No. 1 seed and a raucous crowd, today defeated the Dallas Cowboys, 21-17, in a Divisional Playoff game in Texas Stadium. It was the ninth consecutive road victory for the Giants, an NFL single-season record. They avenged their only road defeat of the season, here on Sept. 9, not to mention the two losses they suffered to the Cowboys in the regular season.

The Giants will have a chance to gain another measure of revenge next Sunday, with considerably higher stakes on the line. The 12-6 Giants will travel to Green Bay to face the Packers in the NFC Championship Game, the Giants’ first since the 2000 season. The Packers defeated the Giants on Sept. 23, 35-13.

Eli Manning threw touchdown passes of 52 and four yards to Amani Toomer and a one-yard run by Brandon Jacobs. The Cowboys scored on Terrell Owens’ five-yard touchdown catch, Marion Barber’s one-yard run and Nick Folk’s 34-yard field goal.

The Giants played with a severely depleted secondary. Sam Madison (stomach) and Kevin Dockery (hip flexor) were inactive. A third cornerback, Aaron Ross, left the game for good in the third quarter with a shoulder injury. That left Corey Webster, R.W. McQauarters and Geoffrey Pope – who spent the entire regular season on the practice squad before joining on the active roster on Dec. 31 – as the only healthy corners. All played extensively in the second half.

Jacobs’ short touchdown run gave the Giants a 21-17 lead with 13:29 remaining in the fourth quarter. It was Jacobs’ third touchdown of the postseason.

The Giants’ six-play, 37-yard drive was set up by McQuarters’ 25-yard punt return. The series began with Manning’s 13-yard pass to Toomer. After a pass to Kevin Boss fell incomplete in the end zone, a four-yard throw to Steve Smith set up a third-and-six as the third quarter ended.

When the teams switched sides, Manning fired an 11-yard pass to Smith, moving the ball to the Dallas nine. Ahmad Bradshaw ran eight yards through the right side before Jacobs bulled his way through the line for the touchdown.

The teams then traded scoring chances – and missed opportunities.

Romo was sacked on the next drive and wound up leaving the field pointing at teammates and pouting after an incompletion. New York then started on its 3-yard line and saw Jacobs get stuffed on a third-and-1.

Dallas had great field position, but Romo wasted it with another sack. Then came a third-down conversion erased by an illegal formation penalty, an intentional grounding on a heave out of bounds and a third-and-20 pass to Terrell Owens that came up short.

Manning was only able to take the clock down to the 2-minute warning on the next drive, ending it with a sack of his own. Dallas had 1:50 seconds to go 48 yards, but Romo couldn’t do it.

A Brett Favre-esque scrambling shovel pass to Jason Witten got the Cowboys to the 22 with 31 seconds left. Then came another false start, a short pass that forced Dallas to use its final timeout and a pair of poor throws — a ball in the end zone that Patrick Crayton seemed to give up on before speeding up at the last second and the final play caught by McQuarters in front of Terry Glenn.

The Cowboys just wasted a 13-3 season, which matched the best in team history. They’re the first No. 1 seed in the NFC to lose in this round since the NFL went to the 12-team playoff format in 1990. They also became the seventh team to lose a playoff game against a team they’d beaten twice in the regular season — joining Dallas’ 1998 club.

Worst of all is the extension of all the skids: Romo now 0-2 in the playoffs, coach Wade Phillips 0-4 and the team 0-for-the-postseason since winning a wild-card game in 1996. The Cowboys have dropped five games since.

TO will have a week to get his popcorn ready as he and the rest of the Cowboys will be spectators like the rest of us as the Giants travel to Lambeau Field to take on the Packers in the NFC Championship Game Sunday night on FOX.