Stephon Gilmore may have put together his best performance in an already-stellar 2019 season. During a Week 12 win, Gilmore erased Dallas Cowboys receiver Amari Cooper, who finished with zero receptions on two targets. To make a baseball reference, this game was Gilmore’s no-hitter in a Cy Young season.

While a shutdown cornerback usually has a quiet game when they’re holding a receiver without a catch, Gilmore managed to make a highlight-reel play. In fact, Patriots coach Bill Belichick said Monday it was “probably one of the best plays we’ve had all year.” Gilmore was trailing Cooper into the flat, where quarterback Dak Prescott fired a target. Gilmore dove to make up ground, and intercepted the pass.

“It was obviously a great play,” Belichick said during a conference call on Monday. “His timing – that was one of the hardest catches. It would have been a good play for him to knock that pass down and he was able to extend and lay out and be able to complete the catch. That was an outstanding play.”

It didn’t hurt that the weather was awful. It was cold, snowy, slushy and wet with just about every unfavorable form of precipitation. Cooper couldn’t have enjoyed trying to run, cut and catch in those conditions. But, of course, Gilmore was dealing with the same conditions, and he managed one more catch than Cooper. The receiver was asked how well Gilmore played.

“Like (a reporter said) said, I only go two targets against him, so it’s hard to tell how good he actually was,” Cooper told reporters after the game at Gillette Stadium on Sunday.

Cooper did record one catch that didn’t count. An offensive holding penalty wiped away a big gain when the Cowboys receiver made a diving catch over the middle of the field. But Gilmore got lucky, and kept Cooper off the stat sheet. Luck was only part of it. Gilmore is an avid student of film, and was careful in breaking down Cooper’s tendencies, just like he does with every pass-catcher. That’s surely how Gilmore anticipated Cooper’s routes, particularly the one where the cornerback logged an interception.