New England Patriots
The Patriots will have their hands full with Will Anderson Jr. and the rest of the fearsome Texans defense, but they should be up for the challenge.
Welcome to Season 14, Episode 19 of the Unconventional Preview, a serious yet lighthearted, nostalgia-tinted look at the Patriots’ weekly matchup …
Drake Maye has handled so much so well in his first full season as the Patriots’ starting quarterback that it’s actually fun to see how the Most Valuable Player candidate navigates new challenges and obstacles.
One of the refrains about him early in the season was, “Yes, he’s obviously talented, but when will he start leading the Patriots to some wins?” The Patriots went 3-9 in his starts last year — and in only one of the wins (against the Bears) did he play the full game. Then the Patriots started 1-2 this season in the advent of the Mike Vrabel era.
Well, he started winning games, and really hasn’t stopped from there. The Patriots enter Sunday afternoon’s divisional matchup with the Texans having won 14 of their last 15 games, including a 16-3 wild-card win over the Chargers. Along the way, Maye passed test after test — beating the defending division champs on the road (Buffalo, Week 5), leading a fourth-quarter comeback to another longtime foe (Baltimore, Week 16), and providing enough highlights along the way to let you kill an hour on YouTube.
Now comes the toughest test, against a Texans team that features arguably the best and almost certainly the meanest defense in the league. In collaboration with offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, he’s going to have to be at his best Sunday. It’s a big challenge, a huge obstacle to navigate. And you what? We can’t wait to see how he goes about it.
Kick it off, Borregales, and let’s get this thing started …
THREE PLAYERS WORTH WATCHING OTHER THAN THE QUARTERBACKS
Will Anderson Jr.: When Mike Vrabel was asked in his Wednesday media availability if the Texans’ defense is the best his team has faced this season, the Patriots’ coach was matter-of-fact in his response.
“Yeah, of course,’’ he said. “I mean, they have great talent, great scheme, they play hard, and I respect how hard they play. They’re not only talented, but they have a play demeanor that I can appreciate.”
For all of the talk about the Patriots’ soft schedule, they have played some decent or better defenses this season — the Chargers, Bills, and Browns ranked in the top 14 in fewest points allowed. But Vrabel could be so casual in affirming that the Texans are the best because it is the obvious truth.
Maye and the Patriots’ offense have faced nothing like the vicious chaos the Texans — who ranked first in total defense (277.2 yards per game) and second in points allowed (17.4, trailing only the Seahawks) — are capable of bringing, particularly with the pass rush. Their season depends on well they handle it.
Anderson, the No. 3 overall pick out of Alabama in 2023 — a pick after the Texans selected Stroud — is a force of nature, a powerful and impossibly quick end who finished with 12 sacks, 23 quarterback hits, and 3 forced fumbles during the regular season. Against the Steelers, he contributed a half-sack, a forced fumble, and laid three QB hits on Aaron Rodgers, who looked ready to begin his inevitable next career as a gasbag podcast host before the fourth quarter was half over.
Alarmingly, at least if you’re a Patriots coach charged with coming up with a scheme to slow these guys, Anderson didn’t even lead the Texans in sacks this year. That accomplishment belonged to veteran Danielle Hunter, who finished with 15 of the Texans’ 47 sacks while registering 22 QB hits, and forcing 3 fumbles. Only the Browns’ Myles Garrett (a record 23 sacks, including five against the Patriots) and the Giants’ Brian Burns (16.5) compiled more. Hunter, like Anderson, was a menace against Rodgers and the Steelers, with a sack, a forced fumble, and two QB hits.
The Patriots’ line, particularly rookies Will Campbell and Jared Wilson on the left side, will have to be much better than they were versus the Chargers. Campbell struggled at left tackle against Chargers pass rusher Odafe Oweh, who sacked Maye three times and forced a pair of fumbles.
The Chargers sacked Maye five times in total, and as Cris Collinsworth observed on NBC’s broadcast, Campbell was often pushed back way too close to Maye even when he fulfilled his blocking assignment.
He must be much better Sunday afternoon against Anderson, whose talents he knows well — they played against each other in college in 2022, when Campbell was a freshman starter at Louisiana State and Anderson a junior All-American at Alabama.
Stefon Diggs: Much of the discourse in the buildup to this game has been, rightfully, about how the Patriots’ offense might counter the Texans’ aggression, especially the aforementioned pass rush.
Maye’s running ability, which was a major factor against the Chargers (10 carries, game-high 66 yards), is something the Patriots can lean on somewhat, especially when the Texans are in man-to-man coverage. But given the viciousness of their defense, which has taken on the playing style of coach and former linebacker DeMeco Ryans, it’s probably risky to give Maye too much of a running workload, particularly since he is not exactly Rickey Henderson when it comes to sliding in safely.
Running backs Rhamondre Stevenson, who has been sensational over the past five weeks, and TreVeyon Henderson should have some success on the ground, but the yardages won’t come easy against linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair and the Texans’ fourth-ranked run defense (93.7 yards per game).
So how else can the Patriots move the ball? Perhaps by leaning on their most experienced player when it comes to big games, and one who has delivered in such scenarios before. Diggs is tops among all Patriots in postseason games — this will be his 16th. He has often come through with big performances in the playoffs, just as he did in a couple of the Patriots’ bigger games during the regular season (10 catches for 146 yards in the Patriots’ Week 5 declaration of legitimacy with a win at Buffalo, 9 catches for 138 yards in the Week 16 comeback against the Ravens).
He has four 100-yard performances in the postseason, 71 catches for 925 yards and 4 touchdowns overall, and, of course, authored one of the more memorable plays in modern postseason history, the Minneapolis Miracle to lift the Vikings over the Saints on the final play of the game in the 2017 postseason. With 75 yards Sunday, Diggs would become the 18th player and third Patriot (joining Rob Gronkowski and Julian Edelman) to reach the 1,000 receiving yards in the postseason.
But this isn’t about milestones. It’s about what the Patriots need from him against a worthy opponent. Diggs, who spent last season with the Texans, built an immediate rapport with Maye. With quick throws a necessity to neutralize that Texans’ rush, Diggs should be both Maye’s security blanket and an effective weapon against a defense that has forced 29 turnovers this season, including 19 interceptions.
Milton Wiliams: For all of the valid talk about the excellence of the Texans’ defense, it should be remembered — in national circles, at least — that the Patriots are coming off a thoroughly dominating defensive performance of their own.
In their 16-3 win in the wild-card round last Sunday night, the Patriots basically turned Chargers star quarterback Justin Herbert into the modern-day Tony Eason, pummeling him with 11 quarterback hits and sacking him six times.
The defining image of the Patriots’ first playoff win since 2018 might have been Williams smothering Herbert on the Gillette Stadium turf on fourth down with 2 minutes remaining in the game. Poor Herbert looked like he needed to take inventory of his body parts before peeling himself up.
Williams had two sacks in the game, which matches the two sacks he had in his last playoff game — the Eagles’ throttling of the Chiefs in Super Bowl LIX last February, when he played such an outstanding game that it was perfectly logical for the Patriots to give him a $104 million contract as a free agent.
He’s been worth every dollar, and chances are he will be again Sunday. Stroud can be erratic under pressure — he fumbled five times, losing two, against the Steelers, who sacked him three times and applied constant pressure.
THE FLASHBACK
This will be the 16th overall meeting between the Patriots and Texans, with New England going 9-4 in the regular season and 2-0 in the postseason.
The playoff victories were both divisional-round games — a 41-28 win in January 2013, and a 34-16 win in January 2017.
But neither of the playoff victories was the most memorable matchup. That has to be the Patriots’ 42-14 thumping of the Texans on “Monday Night Football” in Week 14 of the 2012 season.
A Texans player named Shaun Cody had cooked up the idea of getting custom-made letterman jackets for everyone on the team to wear to the game. The intent was apparently to add patches acknowledging accomplishments to the jackets as the season went on. But the Patriots’ victory was so decisive that the jackets instantly became a punchline, and were never seen again after that night.
My most vivid memory from covering that game isn’t Donte Stallworth’s 63-yard touchdown reception or Brandon Lloyd’s fumble recovery for a touchdown, but the postgame vision of J.J. Watt storming through the bowels of Gillette Stadium on the way to the team bus, wearing that letterman jacket for what almost certainly was the last time.
GRIEVANCE OF THE WEEK
Presumably, most Patriots fans were rooting for the Steelers to beat the Texans last Monday night. There were a few valid reasons to do so: It would give the Patriots a chance to avenge their five-turnover loss in Week 3, avoid this vicious Houston defense, and most importantly, be the lucky team that got to end Rodgers’s season, and perhaps his career. Unfortunately for the Patriots (and Rodgers, I suppose), the Texans did the honors, scoring 23 unanswered fourth-quarter points in a 30-6 win.
PREDICTION, OR I’LL ALWAYS WONDER HOW MUCH PERSONNEL SAY NICK CASERIO REALLY HAD WITH BILL BELICHICK …
The Patriots are as healthy as they have been in a while, while the Texans are likely without stalwart receiver Nico Collins. Still, it’s hard to envision this as anything but a tense, hard-hitting game that comes down to the fourth quarter. A Stroud mistake is the difference. Patriots 17, Texans 13.
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