New England Patriots 2010-11 season review
The Patriots were the toughest team in the 2010-11 regular season. They had a record of 14-2 (best in the league) and were the highest scoring team in the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC).
The Patriots had secured their playoff berth weeks before the regular season ended, and had even got the home field advantage and bye-week they were looking for. Everything was exactly the way it should have been for the Patriots; the way they wanted their
season to turn out.
They ended the regular season on an 8-game winning streak. In those eight games they got revenge for the one game they lost to their division rivals, the New York Jets, early in the season. The Jets were humiliated by a 45-3 pounding by the Patriots.
They also defeated the rest of the teams who are still fighting for the Super Bowl. Pittsburgh was scuttled for 26 points against 39. The Bears were allowed just seven points, while the Patriots scored 36, and the Packers were defeated 27-31. All of those
teams are considered defensive powerhouses yet none of them was able to do anything against quarterback Tom Brady.
Those four teams combined were able to sack Brady just 9 times and still were unable to get him to make a mistake. He threw no interception and fumbled the ball just once in those four games. New England’s offensive line protected Brady like a force field
straight out of Star Trek. Even the Steelers weren’t able to sack Brady.
Then the New York Jets showed up and knocked the patriots out of the playoffs. The offensive line looked unorganised, and the Jets absolutely tore them apart. Brady was under pressure and he made mistakes. It happens to the best of quarterbacks but it’s
particularly frustrating when it happens in the playoffs following a phenomenal regular season.
“We won a bunch in a row against some very good teams and played well,” Brady said. “But playoff football comes, and really, it comes down to who makes the plays. And we made too many mistakes.”
The Patriots weren’t out-coached; they were outplayed by the Jets. New York’s Head Coach Rex Ryan had said that when it came down to the teams, the Patriots and the Jets were equally matched. He believed that Sunday’s game would be a competition between
Patriots’ Coach Bill Belichick and himself. “I was dead wrong,” Ryan said after the winning the game.
In an uncharacteristic down to earth manner, Ryan admitted that he had been defeated in the coaching battle by Belichick. He said that the game actually came down to the players on the field and not the strategies behind the scenes. Ryan said that the Jets
won that battle.
The Patriots haven’t had playoff success since the 2007 season in which they faced the New York Giants in the super bowl. In the 2008 season they weren’t able to make it to the playoffs, and in 2009 they faced a similar fate as this year. They were routed
out by the Baltimore Ravens in the wild-card round of the playoffs.
“They're both leaving a bad taste in my mouth,” a frustrated New England linebacker Tully Banta-Cain said. “The difference was it was a different opponent, and that's really the only difference. Either way you look at it, we're going home.”
Their playoff performance was nothing like what one would expect from a team like the New England Patriots. Banta-Cain further said, “We had gained some momentum from the regular season heading into the playoffs, and it kind of felt like we had some good
steam behind that momentum. And for it to come to a screeching halt, no one was expecting that.” He also added that it was a disappointment, particularly because he knew the Patriots were capable of performing better.
Coach Belichick said that teams are measured by their performances in top level competitions. He said, “There are, obviously, some things that we're going to have to do better relative to that. (We) found that out last year, too.”
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