This is my Patriots tin foil hat moment but I feel like the significance of the 13-3 domination will get lost or marginalized over time since it’s the Patriots. This performance was an all-time epic defensive beat down of such a great offense.
To this day, I remain amazed at what they accomplished. They damn near shut down a team that averaged 33PPG with a defensive roster that nobody was gushing about.
Simply amazing, especially when you add the context of the prior SB where they couldn’t make a single stop.
There's a good article to be written about the best Belichick gameplans of his career.
1990 NFCCG, toppling the 2-time defending champs with an offense that was barely passable
1990 SB, beating Jim Kelly in a gameplan that's in the HOF
1994 AFC WC, Browns/Testaverde over (Parcells-led) Patriots/Bledsoe by intercepting him 3x and kicking the crap out of Ben Coates
2001 SB, obliterating the Greatest Show on Turf
2003 AFCCG, taking the Colts and getting 5 turnovers and a safety as Manning goes criminally insane
2006 AFC DIV vs the 14-2, somehow beating peak Chargers (despite 3 Brady INTs)
2014 AFC DIV vs BAL, the ineligible-receiver stuff and sheer depth of his bag of tricks
2018 SB, taking a rag-tag defense, completely remaking it in 2 weeks, and sowing absolute chaos with a formulaic but powerful Rams offense
(you can argue the 2018 AFCCG was a better overall coaching job in terms of focus, preparation, situations, overtime coin toss calling, etc, but in the SB, the gameplan itself was sublime)
Hon. Mention:
- 1986 NFCCG,
shutting out the Redskins 17-0, who had just taken it to the defending champ Bears the week before
- 2011 AFC DIV vs the Tebow Broncos, 45-10 and it wasn't even
that close - after Tebow had just knocked off the Steelers the week before
I'm not saying the 2018 SB wins a fair, football-educated vote, but it's certainly in the discussion. Also, how different does the Parcells legend look if Belichick isn't there to create absolute magic in back-to-back weeks in 1990 and let him go out on top? Does he get the Patriots job in 1993?