Vikings, Saints Take Note: All's Well Again in New England

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- Two weeks ago, Randy Moss was moping. Last week, he was defiant. This week, Moss was downright goofy, mugging for the crowd, laughing it up on the sidelines and smiling at his questioners in the postgame interviews. That he also caught three touchdown passes in a division-clinching 35-7 victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars was no coincidence. Suddenly, Moss is happy, the Patriots are AFC East champs again and all seems right in New England.

"There's going to be good times and bad times in football," Moss said. "To have the crowd and the stadium behind us, it felt good. My last performance here wasn't too hot. So for everybody to have fun today, I think that was a good thing."

The Minnesota Vikings, stuck in coach/quarterback turmoil up in the frozen north, would do well to pay attention to what's going on here. The New Orleans Saints, losers of two straight in the Superdome and suddenly wondering what happened to the baddest home field advantage in football, may want to have a look as well. Because what the Patriots have done over the past three weeks, methodically managing their way from crisis to coronation, serves as a model for all of these contenders-come-lately. It doesn't matter what you did to get yourself into playoff contention that determines your season; it's what you do now that you're there.

"We didn't really pay attention to the outside noise or anything like that," said Patriots receiver Wes Welker, who caught 13 passes Sunday and now has 122 for the season, once again breaking his own team record. "We knew what we had to do in this room and we stuck to it."

The noise reached its crescendo two weeks ago after a tough 20-10 victory over the Carolina Panthers. Moss caught one pass that day, and the Carolina defenders basically accused him of dogging it. Quarterback Tom Brady was playing with injuries to almost every part of his body, and with Moss shutting it down, he basically had only Welker to throw to. Moss was one of several players suspended earlier that week for being late to practice, and there was much howling and worry about what Bill Belichick and the Pats would do if Moss were really reverting to his old Oakland form.

But that's part of the reason, if you're Robert Kraft, why you pay Belichick and Brady so much. Because in times of trouble, you expect them to lean hard on their experience and their track record and pull the rest of the team through. Belichick and Brady took to the airwaves and stayed candy-cane-sweet in their positive praise of Moss and his unique abilities. They spoke of him as a transcendent talent, one that transforms their offense from good to otherworldly. They insisted they loved, respected and needed him, and that they believed he was still the same old Randy on whom they and their panicky fans had come to count.



And they were right -- both in their assessment and their handling of the situation. Carolina, it turns out, was about to become one of the hottest teams in the league. The Panthers have utterly thrashed the Vikings and the Giants in the two weeks since that game, effectively turning that game into a quality win for the Pats. Moss caught a touchdown last week in Buffalo -- the first real road game the Patriots won all year -- and then Sunday, the comeback was completed. Moss caught three touchdowns and went at it with a fan in a Moss mask while the crowd chanted "Randy! Randy! Randy!" as the Patriots ran up the score.

"I think anytime he scores touchdowns, he gets kind of animated," Brady said of Moss. "You obviously see the kind of influence he's able to have on the game when he's making those plays."

The lessons are all there for the Vikings and the Saints as they work to recover from their own late-season hiccups. The Patriots did three things to handle theirs:

1. They leaned hard on what they knew they could still count on. Welker caught 10 balls in that Carolina game, just four last week in Buffalo when they didn't throw very much, and of course the 13 this week. When a crucial part of your offense is drifting into unreliable territory, it's nice to find something reliable and go to it over and over again. That's what Welker is for Brady and the Pats.

2. They managed Moss. Belichick and Brady knew there was nothing to be gained by punishing Moss or ripping Moss or even by pretending nothing was wrong. They knew Moss was the kind of guy who needs to be needed, and who's interested only in conversations that postulate his own greatness. When Moss was down, they pumped him back up, and they fed him the ball in the end zone.

3. They toughened up in the trenches. Brady pointed out after the game that he hasn't been sacked in four weeks and that the offensive line has allowed only 15 sacks all year. And the Patriots' defense, a major question mark entering the season, has been a quiet strength during their December run.

The result? They may have just played their best game of the year (or second-best, considering they whipped the Titans 59-0 in Week 6) in Week 16 to clinch the division.

"Just better execution," Belichick said. "Nothing revolutionary, nothing new. Just doing a better job of it. I thought we played hard in the games we lost. They were close. We just didn't make enough plays in them to win."

This is how you manage when you have all those rings to flash in your players' faces. You constantly reassure them that, if they stick to the game plan and believe in themselves, that things will be okay. That's what the coaching staffs in Minnesota and New Orleans (and Cincinnati, and Baltimore, and Dallas...) need to find a way to do as the season lurches into crunch time.

The Patriots aren't perfect. They have depth issues. They have running back issues (Laurence Maroney didn't come back into the game after his goal-line fumble on the first drive). They have only two road wins, and one was in London. They may not have the talent that an Indianapolis or a San Diego has, especially if they have to play them on hostile turf. But they do have a champion's confidence. That's what got them this far, and it's what makes them dangerous as they open the playoffs two weeks from now at home.

"If we play like we played today," Brady said. "I'd love to go up against anybody."

That's the feeling you're supposed to have this time of year. The Patriots have it. These other teams that are still trying to find it could do worse than look to New England for an example.