‘Take ‘em to the hill’ — Inside the newest Patriots rallying cry

FOXBOROUGH – Players were tired.

A grueling offseason led them to a taxing fourth quarter. They knew what was at stake. The Patriots entered Paycor Stadium as heavy underdogs behind first-year coach Jerod Mayo. They arrived in Cincinnati with extra motivation thanks to low expectations.

The oddmakers couldn’t have known the levels at which these players were willing to push themselves. That was seen in the final minutes of the Patriots 16-10 upset win over the Bengals.

Up by six with 2:13 left, Rhamondre Stevenson took a handoff and ran 5 yards. That’s when Cincinnati called its first timeout. That’s when K.J. Osborn said the five words out loud:

“Take ‘em to the hill.”

The next play, with 2:08 left, was another Stevenson run. This time he bounced off several Bengals players and ran for 9 yards to pick up the first down. That’s when the two-minute warning was called. That’s when Osborn repeated it.

“Take ‘em to the hill.”

With two minutes left, Stevenson took the ball and ran for 3 yards and the Bengals called their second timeout. Osborn wasn’t going to let his teammates forget.

“Take ‘em to the hill.”

With 1:52 on the clock, Stevenson took one last handoff. He wasn’t tired. He bounced off a defender and carried that man for 9 yards to pick up another first down. The Bengals called their third timeout, but it didn’t matter.

The Patriots had proved their point, running the same play four times in a row, and followed by a quarterback kneel.

“As a receiver, I’m not getting the ball right there. This is all about the O-linemen being physical, downhill running. I was trying to encourage the guys,” Osborn said. “That’s a cultural thing here – after training camp practices and even regular season practices going to run that hill. Just being a better-conditioned team, I think it paid off. That’s what it was – take ‘em to the deep water and go to the hill.”

The Hill isn’t fun, but as the Patriots discovered last weekend, it’s a worthy endeavor. Here’s how an exhausting post-practice run turned into the new slogan and rallying cry for the 2024 Patriots:

It began at halftime

The Hill started as an ode to the Patriots former head coach. It was first called, “Mount Belichick.”

That’s what Bill Belichick remembers about ‘The Hill.’ The former Patriots coach had something similar when he was in Cleveland and told NBC Sports Boston in 2017 that his former Browns players named it after him. In 2013, Belichick had a similar hill constructed between two practice fields behind Gillette Stadium.

At the south end of the main practice field, where the Patriots conduct training camp, ‘The Hill’ starts and leads to a separate practice field where the team routinely practices during the regular season.

“It does suck. I’m not going to lie to you,” safety Jabrill Peppers said. “But it’s beneficial.”

“There’s a quote by Muhamed Ali that says, ‘I hated every minute of training, but it led to me being the champion.’ So, essentially, it’s the same thing,” added Josh Uche. “You’re running and conditioning when you’re tired, the body’s hurting – and everything else. But it pays off later on.”

The main hill was first constructed to be 60 yards with white yard lines painted every five yards. It has a gradual decline. Next to it, there’s a second hill, which is a steeper, 20-yard run. This is where players begrudgingly went post-practice in the spring, summer, fall, and early winter months.

There’s nothing like ending a two-hour practice in 90-degree weather like running up and down a 60-yard hill.

“It symbolizes putting that work in. We finish most of our practices on that hill and we’re usually dog-tired,” Ja’Whaun Bentley said. “When we get down to the fourth quarter, usually, you’re not going to be feeling 100% like you were at the beginning of the game but then it’s like, ‘alright, let’s go to the hill, it’s the fourth quarter.’ It’s something to build off of. It’s got a nice ring to it.”

Different Patriots heard the cry at different times Sunday. For some, it started in the locker room at halftime.

“Take ‘em to the hill.”

Nobody knew who said it first, but it caught on like wildfire. Up 10-0 to the Bengals, the Patriots knew the home team would make a late push.

“After one person said it, the whole team started to say it,” DeMario Douglas said. “And it turned this team up.”

They heard it on the sideline

It wasn’t long before players kept it up.

For many, the five words were heard in the second half. Tyquan Thornton and Vederian Lowe were on the visiting team’s sideline watching the defense when they overheard the phrase.

“Take ‘em to the hill.”

“It was crazy to hear,” Lowe said. “We pushed ourselves as a team. We knew that would be our edge. ‘Take ‘em to The Hill:’ Are they willing to go as far as we are? Are they willing to dig as deep as we have dug to be where we’re at?”

The mantra quickly became a rallying cry. Yes, Patriots players were tired, but as the game wore on, they believed they were the better-conditioned team and aimed to prove it.

“We work hard here,” Thornton said. “So, after a hard practice, we always hit the hill and get extra conditioning in. We always say, ‘put it in the bank,’ so on Sundays, we draw it out.”

In the third quarter, Jonathan Jones made a huge fourth-down stop to earn possession. Even after Cincinnati scored 10 straight points, on two long drives that took up nearly seven minutes, the Patriots never wavered.

For Mayo, who experienced it as a player, ‘The Hill’ is about making participants mentally strong. He knows what it’s like to be exhausted in the fourth quarter. He knows how something like extra conditioning can help pick a team up.

“We talked about artificially creating adversity during practice,” Mayo said. “One of those ways is to go to the hill after a two-hour and 15-minute practice where you go one or two ways. One way is like, ‘Oh man, I got to go to the hill.’ The other way is, ‘All right, we’ve got to break down through this wall and push our bodies.’ Most of the time, and I tell the guys this all the time, your mind is going to give up before your body gives up.

“Being able to go to the hill or take them to the deep water, as we like to say because we do have a lot of faith in our conditioning and what we’ve gone through throughout the summer.”

They heard it on the field

The saying spread in the fourth quarter.

The words echoed through the sideline as players locked in. The slogan originated from the offense, but defensive players heard it repeatedly. Kyle Dugger was playing safety when he heard Brissett scream it from the sideline.

Hearing it was like a surge of adrenaline.

“I remember Jacoby Brissett brought it up,” Davon Godchaux said. “He was like, ‘Let’s take ‘em to the (expletive) hill.”

“It was more so, ‘We’ve got to whoop their ass to win this game,’” Uche added. “It comes down to the conditioning – all the extra conditioning we put into practice and letting everyone know that it’s that time, not to get comfortable. It’s time to make it more uncomfortable.”

As was predicted at halftime, the Bengals made a late charge. At this moment, the Patriots felt better conditioned and believed it would lead them past the heavy favorites.

The defense shut down the Bengals on their final fourth-quarter drive. Cincinnati’s only hope was to get the ball back with a minute left. White Brissett tried to rally his troops in the huddle, he heard Osborn say it over and over again.

“That’s one of the cooler moments in my career, everybody in the huddle saying, ‘Let’s take ‘em to the hill,’” Brissett said. “We knew we were in that much better shape than they were and it paid off.”

“We were basically stating, ‘Finish the game, they’re not built like us, they didn’t put in the work we put in,’” Antonio Gibson added.

At this point, the Patriots were confident. With each snap, players let out loud grunts, making a final push. They imposed their will on the Bengals’ defense, which was unable to keep up the climb.

“It’s big for us because that’s a hill that we’ve got to pay our respects to every day,” Bentley said. “It’s always good having other teams experience that with us.”

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