Before the Patriots faced the Colts on Saturday, many wondered whether a loss actually could help New England. The theory was based on the notion that teams riding long winning streaks — the Patriots had won seven in a row — can benefit from being humbled before the playoffs.
Well, the Patriots did lose to Indianapolis, and in a somewhat embarrassing fashion. Expectedly, the same people believe the ugly defeat could be good for New England in the long run.
But Bill Belichick isn’t buying it. The head coach was asked about the idea during a video conference Monday morning.
“I don’t know,” Belichick said. “We’ll see. We’ll see what happens this week. We usually don’t focus too much on what happened the week before, good or bad. After we get through it and correct it, talk about it, focus on the game that’s coming up and try to prepare the best we can for it. I don’t think living in the past and worrying about last week’s game all week and all the psychological effects and bunch of other garbage, I don’t think that has anything to do with the Buffalo game.
“Either we’re going to prepare well, perform well, execute well in the game, and make good decisions, coaches, players, and all that, or we’re not. I don’t really know what last week, two weeks ago, or some game in 2006 had to do with it. I don’t think any of that has a whole lot of bearing on it. It shouldn’t. Maybe the team’s not prepared to handle it. I don’t think it should. I don’t know why it should.”
While the loss to Indy might not “help” the Patriots, per se, players and coaches certainly could take lessons from what apparently was a bad week of practice that led to an equally poor gameday performance.
The Patriots will host the Buffalo Bills this Sunday with first place in the AFC East on the line.
