FRISCO, Texas -- The Dallas Cowboys will hold their final Wednesday practice of the 2017 season today at The Star.

The next time they will have a full-fledged Wednesday practice won’t come until next September as they get ready for the 2018 opener.

The 2017 season is over, save for Sunday’s finale against the Philadelphia Eagles. The only thing on the line with Sunday's outcome is a change in draft position. With a win, coach Jason Garrett would avoid his fourth 8-8 record in seven seasons. If the Cowboys lose and fall to 8-8, only former Titans and Rams coach Jeff Fisher would have more .500 finishes (5).

With a loss next Sunday, the Cowboys would finish a season 8-8 for the fourth time during Jason Garrett's tenure. AP Photo/Ron Jenkins

Players and coaches will be playing and coaching for jobs here or elsewhere on Sunday, but the outcome is meaningless for this season.

“Got to love football to look forward to next week,” defensive end Tyrone Crawford said after last week’s loss to the Seattle Seahawks that eliminated the Cowboys from playoff contention. “I’ll definitely be that guy that’s going to say that in the locker room and make sure guys know that that’s how I’m going into the game. And I’ll have words for people that really aren’t going in that way.”

The Cowboys did not start their quest to make the playoffs on their Sept. 10 opener against the New York Giants. It actually started in March when informal workouts began at The Star.

Back then, the Cowboys carried with them the disappointment of the stinging divisional-round loss to the Green Bay Packers in January when they had home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. The work continued into the official start of the offseason program, organized team activities, minicamp and training camp.

The Week 16 loss to the Seahawks brought emptiness that the 10 months of work might have been wasted.

“You play to win,” said kicker Dan Bailey, who missed two field goal attempts on Sunday. “You play to have a chance at the end of the year to go to the postseason and hopefully go all the way. Sometimes it doesn’t really matter how you get in. It’s just if you get in and to come up short in a game like [Sunday] is disappointing. Just got to take a look at it, learn from it and hopefully move forward in a positive direction.”

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A win against Seattle would not have clinched a playoff berth for the Cowboys. They still would have needed to beat Philadelphia and have the Atlanta Falcons lose to the Carolina Panthers. The season's demise did not hinge on the loss to the Seahawks. It was an accumulation that began earlier in the season: losing twice at home despite scoring at least 30 points against the Los Angeles Rams and Packers as well as Ezekiel Elliott’s six-game suspension.

“Ideally you’re not in this position at this point of the season and there were games that were close that we didn’t win and last year we did win them,” linebacker Sean Lee said. “And that’s why we had the record we had. We’re going to have to get back, finish the season right, understand that our season slips away if you don’t play well early and you lose close games.”

Garrett has received owner Jerry Jones’ backing. The owner and general manager does not want to change head coaches, but there could be staff changes. A number of coaches have expiring contracts. Those questions will be answered after Sunday.

“We just got to get back to work and we’ve got to finish strong,” Garrett said. “'Finish' is a really important word for us. Each play. Each day. Each game. And we certainly have to finish the season the right way and we have the right kind of guys to do that."