Fifteen reasons the Patriots win on Saturday (and one compelling reason they lose)

By Os Davis  |   Wednesday, December 26, 2007  |  Comments( 10 )

New England Patriots
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No matter how it all pans out in Saturday's New England Patriots-New York Giants clash, the audience of millions (thanks to an unprecedented show of generosity, the game will be a rare triple broadcast) will see sports history in the making: It'll either mark the first 16-game undefeated season or the first time a 15-0 team loses. Ever.

Though most of America reportedly wants the once-loved, once-plucky upstart Patriots to go down, RealFootball365.com is here to tell you it just ain't gonna happen.

In honor of the momentous occasion, presenting 15 reasons why 15-win New England takes this final game into the record books. And one compelling, disturbing reason why the Pats can't.

1. Tom Brady, whose 48 touchdown passes leave him one shy of tying old rival Peyton Manning's single-season record.

2. Brady-to-Moss. Randy "Hell, I'm Randy Moss. What do you expect?" Moss is one TD pass reception short of Hall of Famer Jerry Rice for the single-season record at 21.

3. The Giants' pass defense is good, but accomplished QBs kill 'em. Not to put too fine a point on it, but figure the Patriots to pass early (to achieve those individual records) and often (because this is the last action these guys get for weeks) in the Meadowlands.

Statistically, New York enters the game with pretty decent 'D' against the pass, ranking eighth overall in terms of aerial yards allowed and giving up just a scanty 6.9 per pass play. However, over the course of this easy schedule (see reason No. 8 below), the Giants have been torched by guys like Tony Romo (345 yards, four TDs, one pick), Brett Favre (286 yards, three TDs, one interception), and Romo again (247, four and one on 20 of 28 passing). Heck, Rex Grossman nearly went for 300 against 'em and Jon Kitna bagged 377 in a Week 11 loss. At this point, the only question is: What's the over/under on Brady's yards in this game?

4. The team-of-destiny thing. Trying to keep the mumbo-jumbo to a minimum, how else do you explain that great escape against the Baltimore Ravens? A well-timed implosion, indeed. How else to explain the table-setting games against Dallas, Indianapolis and Philadelphia in which New England was forced to show its classic fourth-quarter brilliance? Mystic forces, folks.

5. Special teams. Back in the day when today's Darth Vader Patriots were perceived of as cute little Anakin Skywalker, Belichick's guys were known for their special teams play. This aspect of New England's game has been underrated by media and blogosphere; well, don't look now, but the special teams are baaaaaaaack. Assuming, of course, that Troy Brown doesn't get one bounced off the facemask this week ...

6. The offensive line trumps the defensive attack. The play of the game in the rout of Miami? Check out Matt Light and Heath Evans ripping a huge hole for Laurence Maroney on the long second-quarter TD run at about 1:13 in NFL.com's video clip. This ain't no Winston Justice.

7. Too many weapons. Speaking of Maroney, the halfback was perhaps the Pats' player of the game in running up 156 yards, tops in the league last week; two weeks ago, he went eight carries for a whopping 18 yards and prior to Week 14 hadn't seen 100 yards since September. And who's that with four TDs in the past five games? Jabar Gaffney? And do you realize 22 players have scored for New England in 2007? I've said it before and I'll say it again: Whoa.

8. This one has to hurt Giant backers: With the exception of squeaker Washington, New York hasn't beaten a playoff team all year. Meanwhile, the G-men have lost at Dallas, vs. Green Bay, vs. Dallas, vs. Minnesota and vs. Washington. Ouch.

9. The Pats can stop the run; besides, it may not matter. Sure, since Week 5 the three-headed monster - Brandon Jacobs, Derrick Ward and Ahmad Bradshaw - has turned in some nifty performances, six times topping 100 yards and currently boasting the fourth-most yards per game. Meanwhile, New England allows just a hair under 100 yards per game at 99.5. Why is this so important? In the six above-mentioned games, New York is 5-1.

But.

Against Pittsburgh, one of three teams more prolific at the run than the Giants, wicked Willie Parker went for 124 yet the Pats still beat up on the Steelers 34-13. New England's passing offense can run up such a score so quickly that it forces many a successful running team to go to the air quickly. Then it's Pro Bowler Asante Samuel's time, right?

10. Home-field advantage has disappeared. This story is completely insane. How can Giants fans be missing out like this? Do they realize that Boston to New York is roughly a four-hour drive or, what, a 60-minute flight? The only hope to take the Patriots' fan base out of this game is to pray for blizzard-like conditions, between Boston and New York, focused mainly on, say, US Route 1.

(On second thought, this might not be a bad thing; the Giants are just 3-4 before the home crowd this season.)

11. It's the homestretch. In the season's fourth quarter, the A.B. (After Belichick/Brady) Patriots are 22-5.

12. It's the homestretch. At 4-3 this season, Tom Coughlin's Giants have "improved" to 13-18 in the season's second half since he took over in 2004.

13. The Patriots don't lose to the NFC. Make of this what you will, but the Patriots haven't lost to an NFC team since Week 2 of 2005 against the then-NFC champion Carolina Panthers; before that, you have to go back to Week 4 of 2003.

14. The weight of history seems to be nothing to these guys. Has there ever been a dynastic squad so free of head cases and ego trippers? Matt Light was on "PTI" last week and it was revealed that ... he's a nice guy who loves his coach! Even the Dark Lord, Belichick himself, is trying to lighten his image more than anyone this side of Hillary Clinton. ("Awesome," eh? Doing pre-game hype, eh?) Hate to say it, but this businesslike attitude transfers to the play on the field.

15. They just many want it more. The Patriots have that one intangible that all dominant sports teams possess -- willpower. Surely we'll see that series against the Giants - you know the one, the one that says "All right, we're done messing around and it's time to bear down and take over." Whether manifesting itself in back-to-back three-and-outs created by the defense or a long drive of nine plays peppered with Wes Welker receptions and ending with a strike to Moss, that series is about the mental game. It's about the will.

And then there's the reason this interested observer can't avoid:

1. The numbers. A stat geek like yours truly reckons that one of the things about stats is that they tend to balance out. Granted, games like football and soccer hardly lend themselves to numerical measure in the way baseball and basketball do, but things tend to level out.

And right now, there's a lot of numerical karma stacked against the Patriots. How can this team continue this barrage?

In the end, stats teach us stuff like "The average team goes .500 on the season" and "all other things being equal, the home team is the favorite." Also, no matter how awesome the given team or individual, "streaks end." This can't happen, right? NFL teams don't go undefeated in the 16-game season and they don't win 20 consecutive regular-season games.

Do they?

Awaiting sports history this Saturday and all year-round at RealFootball365.com
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About Os Davis

Os Davis has taken a twisted route to get to RealFootball365.com in his nearly 17 years in professional writing, working in any number of capacities in the sportswriting, news reporting and film criticism worlds. In print media, Os has served as editor at a few publications, including Albuquerque's ...
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CommentsComments: 10  |  Sign Up  View all comments
No.1
Carl		10:35 AM
12/27/2007
Its good to see that the whole world has finally figured out what I've been saying for months. This is the real super bowl. Thats ...
No.2
CM		04:26 PM
12/27/2007
In response to the e-mail by Carl,you're an IDIOT!What are you smoking?You must be living under a rock!I understand alot of ...
No.3
Andy		06:31 PM
12/27/2007
So Boston is the "city of chokers"? Would you please be so kind as to tell us who coughed up the 3 games to none lead in the ...
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