FOXBOROUGH — When Jerod Mayo entered the home locker room at Gillette Stadium after a gutsy 25-22 upset of the Jets, the Patriots coach had a tongue-in-cheek message for his players.
“That wasn’t a soft win.”
Mayo’s “soft” comments from London reverberated all week long and were still making headlines on Sunday morning. Everybody from Bill Belichick to Rex Ryan condemned Mayo’s characterization of his team’s play overseas. The feedback outside of the facility in Foxborough was universally negative.
None of that mattered.
After a turbulent week, Mayo’s players responded with a punch-em-in-the-mouth victory. Message received. And this wasn’t simply Drake Maye saving the day. Though he was off to an excellent start, the rookie left the game with a concussion in the second quarter. With Jacoby Brissett under center, the Patriots needed contributions from across the roster.
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Ultimately, they delivered a win in the most sandpapery way possible.
With 25 seconds remaining, the Patriots trailed by five points and faced a fourth-and-goal and the football inside the 1-yard line. Alex Van Pelt sent guard Sidy Sow into the game as a fullback and tackle Zach Thomas as an extra tight end. Everybody at Gillette Stadium knew Rhamondre Stevenson was getting the football. It’d simply come down to who was the tougher team in that one moment.
“The win is kind of on my back at this point of the game,” Stevenson said. “I knew I had to get in regardless of what happened.”
With a crease just big enough on the right side of the offensive line, Stevenson did indeed lower his shoulder and find the end zone.
“We knew what (Patriots coaches) were going to call,” tackle Vederian Lowe said. “It just shows the resilience that we have as a unit. To go out there, for them to know that we’re going to run the ball… and just execute, it shows a lot of resilience.”
Despite being undermanned on defense, the Patriots fared better than in their first matchup against the Jets last month. Davon Godchaux credited that to cutting the “cute (expletive)” out of their game and getting back to basics. Even without Kyle Dugger, Jabrill Peppers and Daniel Ekuale — all of whom played in the first Jets game — and Ja’Whaun Bentley and Christian Barmore, the Patriots held Aaron Rodgers to 22 points.
“It’s just knock-back football, played our assignments and knew our calls. We stopped the run,” Godchaux said. “Once you got a mindset you’re gonna knock a (expletive) back and not let him drive you off the ball… you got a mindset that you’re gonna be disruptive and knock a guy back, shed blocks, it’s all in the mind.”
The game certainly wasn’t perfect, but after Mayo’s barbs about soft play, his team returned to a tough brand of football. It’s clear that Mayo got through to his players and that the first-year coach still has the respect of his locker room.
“I believe this: He wouldn’t say anything to the media that he wouldn’t say to our faces,” Keion White said. “So when somebody calls you out as a man, you can’t get all sensitive about it. You have to just say, ‘OK, I’m going to show you.’ Take it as a challenge. I think we did that and that’s just a testament to his coaching and how we’re receptive to him as a coach. Because we didn’t get defensive and we didn’t shut down. We took it as a challenge.
“We still have his back and we still want to play for him. I feel like we showed that.”
