ORCHARD PARK - The Buffalo Bills sent up a screaming, red-hot warning flare Sunday night for all of the AFC to see.

The Bills may still be on the outside looking in regarding the playoff bracket, but after the way they went into Kansas City last week and beat the Chiefs, and then completely dismantled the Dallas Cowboys 31-10 at rainy Highmark Stadium, the Bills are making a case that they might be the one team no one would want to play come January.

Of course, the problem here is that they still have to get to January for that to even become a thing. Their work is far from done and the 8-6 Bills didn’t get much help around the rest of the AFC this weekend as the Browns (9-5), Browns, Bengals and Texans (all 8-6) won their games to stay ahead of Buffalo in the wild-card chase.

However, with two winnable games against the Chargers on Saturday and the Patriots on New Year's Eve, the chances now seem pretty good that if they win those two and Miami loses to either Dallas next week or at Baltimore, the Bills will have a chance to not only make the playoffs, but win the AFC East in the season finale at Miami.

Here’s how I graded the Bills:

PASS OFFENSE: C

I mean, the real grade should be incomplete, but I’ll go with this just because the passing game had so little to do with the outcome. Allen completed only five passes for 73 yards in the first half yet the Bills were up 21-3. Crazy. That’s how dominant the Bills rushing attack was. His night ended with 10:37 left in the fourth quarter when Sean McDermott called off the dogs and sent Kyle Allen in to hand off to whichever running back was behind him.

Allen finished just 7 of 15 for 94 yards and if anyone had given you that stat line before the game, you would have thought either he got hurt and left the game, or the Bills got blown out. Neither happened.

Allen could have had better numbers, but Dalton Kincaid dropped two passes and Stefon Diggs one in the first half. Not that it mattered because the only one of those that ruined a drive was the first one by Kincaid as Buffalo scored touchdowns on their other three possessions.

One of the biggest concerns the Bills had coming into the game was whether the offensive line would be able to protect Allen and give him time to throw, but it became an irrelevant point once James Cook got rolling on the ground. But when Allen needed to make a play, he hit Diggs for a big 18-yard gain on the first TD drive, found Diggs who made a brilliant catch for 17 yards on the fourth TD drive, and then he hit Cook on a pretty 18-yard TD pass for the second TD.

RUN OFFENSE: A+

Wow, what a night for James Cook. The Bills clearly saw an opportunity to run against the Cowboys and they exploited it with spectacular results as James Cook had the best game of his young career. Cook had 104 yards by the end of the first half and surpassed his career-high total of 123 set last year against the Bears by early in the third quarter.

He finished with 179 yards on 25 carries and a touchdown, and he added two catches for 42 yards and another TD. His 221 yards from scrimmage shattered his previous high of 159 set in that same Bears game. The Bills finished with 266 yards rushing, the highest total of the Sean McDermott coaching era.

It was stunning to see the Bills’ offensive line carving huge holes against Dallas’ supremely talented defensive front. Micah Parsons and DeMarcus Lawrence were basically invisible and before the third quarter ended, the Bills had already surpassed their season-high rushing total of 192 yards against Denver.

When Cook needed a breather, Ty Johnson stepped in and the beat kept going as Johnson rushed for 54. That qualified as the fourth-best of his career.

PASS DEFENSE: A

Before the garbage time began midway through the fourth quarter, the Bills held Dak Prescott to 13 of 24 for a mere 82 yards with an interception. He then piled up meaningless completions and yards with his team trailing 31-3 and just trying to get the game over with.

The entire Cowboys team was a no-show, but their offense came into this game on a lethal pace scoring nearly 40 points per game during their five-game winning streak. Buffalo’s pass rush, which was probably helped by the fact that Dallas lost All-Pro right guard Zack Martin to an injury in the first quarter, was all over Prescott. He was under pressure consistently and while there were only three sacks for 28 yards, there were many times when he had to either hurry his throws or just throw it away.

CeeDee Lamb went over the 100-catch mark for the season, but he was a non-factor, at least until he scored on a three-yard reverse with 2:48 left to play. He was not nearly as invisible as fellow WRs Brandin Cooks and Michael Gallup who did nothing - a combined three catches for 19 yards.

Christian Benford had the Bills’ interception, and Leonard Floyd, Jordan Phillips, Tyrel Dodson and Greg Rousseau were involved in the sacks.

RUN DEFENSE: A

Tony Pollard was never able to get going. He finished with 52 yards on 11 carries, but early in the game when it was still close, Pollard was held in check on several key plays that either put Dallas in a bad down-and-distance situation, or failed on a third-down run.

Yes, the Cowboys missed Martin, but the rest of their linemen are very good players but the Bills’ front seven was ravenous. Sean McDermott utilized a number of run blitzes which worked as the Cowboys couldn’t get things blocked properly.

Taylor Rapp and Dodson led the Bills with eight tackles apiece while Taron Johnson was in on seven stops, a few of those in the run game.

SPECIAL TEAMS: A

Sam Martin was able to draw a roughing the punter penalty in the second quarter which gave the Bills a first down and they took advantage by driving to their second touchdown.

Deonte Harty had a nice 21-yard punt return that helped improve field position on a drive that ultimately ended with Tyler Bass’ lone field goal. Bass also made all four of his extra points and he had four kickoff touchbacks.

On the two kickoffs that were returned, Cam Lewis made two nice tackles, both of which prevented the Cowboys from reaching the touchback line of the 25.

COACHING: A+

Give Joe Brady credit because it had to be hard to take the ball out of Allen’s hands, at least early in the game. You always want Allen driving the bus, but in this game they didn’t need the QB to do much of anything. Brady schemed up a superb run game plan and then the players executed it flawlessly. That’s one of the keys for a coordinator, to be able to find the weaknesses in a defense and then exploit them, and Brady soared in this game.

On defense, McDermott did just as superb a job as he limited the Cowboys to 195 total yards, their lowest output of the season while the 10 points matched their lowest which they also had in a 42-10 loss to the 49ers. McDermott was aggressive in both blitzing, the four-man pass rush, and in his coverage calls. He dictated the game to Dallas rather than the other way around.

Overall, it was a close to perfect a victory for the Bills and the coaching staff dominated Dallas’ staff.

Sal Maiorana can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @salmaiorana and on Threads @salmaiorana1. To subscribe to Sal's newsletter, Bills Blast, which comes out twice a week during the season, please follow this link: https://profile.democratandchronicle.com/newsletters/bills-blast

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Bills vs. Cowboys report card: Buffalo dominates 31-10 to put AFC on notice