LAS VEGAS — Bill Belichick preached the importance of unity after his New England Patriots suffered the unlikeliest of losses Sunday.
The Raiders defeated the Patriots 30-24 at Allegiant Stadium after linebacker Chandler Jones picked off an unnecessary Jakobi Meyers lateral and returned it 48 yards for a walk-off touchdown — the first of its kind in NFL history.
Speaking in a funereal Patriots locker room after the game, longtime special teams captain Matthew Slater shared Belichick’s message to the team following this crushing defeat.
“Stay united,” Slater said. “You lose a game like this, a lot of teams turn on each other, start pointing fingers. There’s going to be people seeking to divide this team, seeking to tear it down, and we have to rise above all that.”
Slater, the longest-tenured Patriots player, experienced a similarly devastating outcome in the 2018 Miami Miracle game, which New England lost on a last-second schoolyard play that featured multiple Dolphins laterals. The 37-year-old knows internal strife could follow a result like Sunday’s and said the team must work hard to combat it.
“We can’t be divided,” Slater said. “I think there will be a lot of folks throwing a lot of stones. We just have to keep believing in one another. We can’t turn on each other, and just stay the course. Obviously, it goes without saying, it’s tough losing a game like that, but it’s nobody’s fault. We win as a team, lose as a team and we’ve just got to keep fighting.”
Asked how the Patriots can avoid that division, Slater replied: “Don’t read what you guys write, don’t read what you guys report and just worry about what goes on inside of our walls.”
Slater also voiced his support for Meyers and running back Rhamondre Stevenson, who both lateraled the ball on the final play. If either had been tackled or run out of bounds, the game would have gone to overtime. Meyers and Stevenson are New England’s two most productive and reliable offensive weapons, making their decisions in that moment especially surprising. Both said the play did not call for any downfield lateraling.
“It’s unfortunate,” Slater said. “Look, our guys are trying to make a play to win the game. There’s nobody we trust more on the team than Jakobi and Mondre, so we live with the decisions they make. I’ve got no problem with it.”
Both players owned up to their mistakes after the game, with Meyers doing so in a tearful media scrum in front of his locker.
“It’s not his fault,” Slater said. “We wouldn’t be in the game without him. He’s one of the most dependable, smartest, toughest football players on this team, and we’ll go down with him 10 out of 10 times.”
Other Patriots leaders also backed Meyers, with quarterback Mac Jones calling the wideout “one of the best teammates (he’s) ever had” and safety Devin McCourty saying he’s “as close as someone can be to being a team captain.”
Now 7-7 and outside of the AFC playoff picture, the Patriots will look to salvage their season as they host Cincinnati this Saturday. They remain alive for a postseason berth but likely would need to win at least two of their final three games (home against the Bengals and Dolphins and at the Buffalo Bills) to qualify.
