Stefon Diggs: ‘Nobody really liked’ or believed in these young Patriots

New England Patriots

These Patriots are the No. 2-seed, but they still carry an underdog-like chip on their shoulders.

FOXBOROUGH – After Sunday night’s victory against the Chargers, the No. 2-seeded Patriots are one of five AFC teams left standing.

But the way this season has unfolded, with New England going from worst-to-first in the AFC East and winning 14 regular-season games before advancing to the divisional round of the playoffs, was nearly impossible to predict.

This was a team that won four games a year ago. Six wins would have been an improvement. Eight wins would have been twice as good. Not long ago, a 10-win prediction seemed like it would have been pushing it.

Now, the Patriots are two wins away from a potential Super Bowl appearance. Their underdog status has been suspended for at least one more week, with only top-seeded Denver outranking them in the AFC. But that doesn’t mean the team isn’t carrying a chip on it’s shoulder.

Standing at his locker with microphones and TV cameras pointed towards him, Stefon Diggs answered a question about why he told this team that no one liked them or believed in them during his pregame speech.

“I think, from my vantage point, obviously we’ve got a different scope of things,” Diggs said. “But, y’all are in the media. You see it each and every day. I don’t think nobody really liked us, nobody really believed in us.”

“Maybe we were a young team,” Diggs added. “We’ve got a young quarterback and throughout the season, we just grew and we kind of grew together. As we’ve had this success, everybody’s been humbled, everybody’s been unselfish, and everybody wants to win.”

Defensive tackle Milton Williams, who closed out Sunday’s game with a 4th-down sack of Justin Herbert, said he thrives when people doubt him. Showing up every day and putting work in helps him filter through the noise and build confidence.

So did a message that coach Mike Vrabel delivered to Williams and Christian Barmore earlier in the week.

“That was the first thing in our first meeting of the week. He looked at me and [Barmore] and said ‘the big dogs show up in January’. We were hearing that all week, and we showed up.”

“I was like ‘alright’. Talk that [expletive],” Williams said with a grin. “I want to hear it. I like when people talk [expletive]. It just gives me a little extra juice.”

Cornerback Carlton Davis said there has been an emphasis on shutting out the noise and allowing the team’s play to speak for itself.

“Personally, I’m not really worried about being an underdog as far as what people are saying around the league,” Davis said. “I just want to go out there and prove it. I think this team wants to go out and prove it. A lot of the things that we talk about in our locker room and the team room is not worrying about the outside noise and just concentrating on what we have to do and playing to our identity.”

This season, MVP candidate Drake Maye and his explosive playmaking have been the subject of many headlines. But, on Sunday, it was the defense that held the Chargers to three points and propelled the Patriots to the next round.

The doubters are still out there, and next week brings another opportunity to show what this team is made of.

“Proud of this team. We never doubted it,” Maye said. “We never doubted it. Wasn’t pretty, that’s for sure. But this defense was so fun to watch. Congrats to them. It was so fun to watch.”

“They won the game for us. I didn’t throw very well tonight. Need to be better. We did what we had to do. That’s what it takes in the Playoffs. Proud of this team. That was fun to get one at home. Look forward to being back here next week.”

Khari A. Thompson

Sports Reporter

Khari Thompson covers professional sports for Boston.com. Before joining the team in 2022, Khari covered college football for The Clarion Ledger in Jackson, Miss.