Curran: Patriots put mental toughness on display in win over Texans

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Who knows how the gamewill gowhat theyll do, how things will match up, what adjustments youllhave to make and how the game will unfold. There will be different breaks orsituations in the game that will make each game unique. That makes it exciting . . .This is how we think its going to workout. It never quite goes that way.

As a coach, you want to try to put your teamin the best position you can so they can be competitive. As players, its thesame thing. Its like when you talk to the Navy SEALs and those guys talk about whenthey go on a mission, how they talk about, Alright, so we get there and wepracticed going over a six-foot wall and the wall is 30-feet high. Well,thats the way it is in the NFL. You practice for whateveryou think youregoing to swim across a 200-yard lake and the lake is 800 yards across. You haveto get across it. You get in an NFL game and think youre going to get this andthen you get that.

Bill Belichick, on Friday before the AFCDivisional Playoff game against HoustonBefore Sundays game was 12 seconds old, thePatriots had allowed a 94-yard kickoff return. Before it was 90 seconds old,they had lost their most experienced running back, Danny Woodhead. Before itwas seven minutes old, they had lost their Pro Bowl tight end Rob Gronkowski. The wall got higher. The lake got wider. The Patriots stilladvanced to their seventh AFC Championship game in 12 seasons with a 41-28 winover the Houston Texans. All season long, Tom Brady has gone to the figurative whip.Every chance hes gotten to speak of a need for mental toughness, hes taken it.Brady wouldnt mention mental toughness if it wasnt a concern. If he didntwant the message hes delivered in private to be amplified, hed never put itin the public domain. But he has. And Sunday was a study in mental toughness. I think thats been the mark of our team, Brady said,though he was despondent just before Christmas after a lackluster win in Jacksonville. Weve won11 of 12. We were down 31-3 at home (to SanFrancisco on December 17) and battled back. I thinkwere going to be in it. We have a lot of tough guys, mentally tough guys.Whatever happens, like what happened on the first play of the game, youve gotto overcome it. We made some key plays when we needed to. Shane Vereen madethem, Wes Welker made them, Brandon Lloyd made them, so it was a greateffort. Offensive line was awesome, as usual.Vereen is an extremely talented player who -- in his secondseason in the league -- wasnt where he needed to be a month ago. A fumbleagainst the 49ers that led to points. A missed blocking assignment against Jacksonville that gotBrady blown up. Sunday, Vereen wasnt just making simple plays he ought to make, he was making outstandingplays including a momentum-building touchdown early in the fourth on anover-the-shoulder catch most wideouts would bungle. Hoomanawanuis performance wasnt as gaudy as Vereens butit was every bit as necessary once Gronkowski went to the sidelines. "Hooman Michael Hoomanawanui and Shane Vereen stepped inthere and both did a good job for us, said Belichick. "Shane obviously made alot of big plays but Hooman did a great job too, as hes been doing for thelast month. These kinds of games, you never really know when the dial spins,where its going to wind up, who its going to end up on. Those guys were prepared."And its not as if the Patriots were going to veer fromtheir plans because they lost some players."We had a whole plan built for Gronkowski and Woodhead," Brady said. "We run the first series of the game and all those plans change. Ithink a little of it was What are we going to do now? How are we going toadjust? But we seemed to settle in there midway through the first quarter andput together a pretty good game. Obviously its a bummer to lose anybody, butsomeone of Robs importance or Dannys importance, we need guys to step in andfill the void, whether its this game or any game after.The finality of playoff football was stressed this week. But so wasthe need to play freely enough and not allow the moment to be too big. You dont win a war by digging a foxhole and sitting in it,said Belichick. You need to attack.Sunday night, Logan Mankins smiled when asked if he wantedto play the Texans. We wanted to play them because they wanted to play us,said the veteran guard. Now come the Ravens who have already begun flapping theirgums at New England, led by special teamer BrendonAyanbedejo. Via Twitter, the 36-year-old -- who should know better by now -- saidthe following.

New England does some suspect stuff on offense. Can't really respect it. Comparable to a cheap shot b4 a fight Brendon Ayanbadejo (@brendon310) January 13, 2013Are you watching the game pats vs texans? If so you see the hurry snap offense catch em b4 they set up. It's a gimmick. Brendon Ayanbadejo (@brendon310) January 13, 2013Their offense is good enough to be successful with out that Brendon Ayanbadejo (@brendon310) January 13, 2013You know the same organization that did spygate and cut a guy the day b4 the Super Bowl Brendon Ayanbadejo (@brendon310) January 13, 201318-1 Brendon Ayanbadejo (@brendon310) January 13, 2013In a sport that is predicated on mano y mano, " lets hurry up n snap it " = bitchassness Brendon Ayanbadejo (@brendon310) January 13, 2013
There are myriad ways to interpret the why of whatAyanbadejo tweeted. One of them is to chalk it up to fear. Ayanbadejo knowswhich team is better right now and it aint his. Hence, tugging on Supermanscape. When youre playing at this time of year, each game getstougher, each game gets bigger, said Belichick. I think the Ravens certainlyshowed how physically and mentally tough they were to go out there and comefrom behind and beat Denverin a tough environment. That showed a lot of character, resiliency andtoughness. Our game with them this year, our game with them last year, wentdown to the last possession, the last play, however you want to look at it.Theres no doubt the Ravens have some mental toughness. Butthey are playing next Sunday against a team thats been to seven AFCChampionships in 12 seasons. A team thats 5-1 in those games. The Patriotsshowed Sunday -- again -- which waytheyll go when it comes time to put up or shut up.

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