How Patriots Learned Their Lesson On Final Play Of Win Over Bills

The Patriots weren’t about to let another Miami Miracle foil their most impressive win of the Mac Jones era.

After a 1-yard touchdown pass to Mike Gesicki put New England ahead 29-25 with 12 seconds remaining, the Bills had one last chance to respond. A shot down the middle to Stefon Diggs fell incomplete, leaving Buffalo with a final desperation play from its own 25-yard line.

Faced with a similar situation five years ago, the Patriots infamously positioned tight end Rob Gronkowski near the goal line — a fine defense against a heave into the end zone, but a disastrous one against the catch-and-run, multi-lateral approach they wound up facing. Kenyan Drake found a seam after a series of pitches and outran the lumbering Gronk to the pylon to give the Dolphins the unlikeliest of victories.

Lesson learned.

On Sunday, rather than have, say, 6-foot-5 Pharaoh Brown patrol the secondary for the Bills’ last-gasp comeback bid, the Patriots instead inserted a pair of standout special teamers: Matthew Slater and Brenden Schooler.

As New England’s top punt gunners, Slater and Schooler are two of the team’s best open-field tacklers. They lined up 15 yards off the line of scrimmage, clearly aiming to snuff out any hook-and-lateral shenanigans.

Quarterback Josh Allen, seeing no open receivers, took off running, then lateraled to no one as he was dragged to the turf. Schooler shot in to recover and ice the game.

It was the first career defensive snap for Schooler, a second-year pro who quickly established himself as one of the NFL’s premier special teams aces. It was Slater’s first since 2020 and just his fourth since 2012, as far back as Pro-Football-Reference’s snap count data goes.

“It was fun,” Slater, who moonlighted as an emergency cornerback early in his career, said Monday in a video conference. “Those are situations that we prepare for throughout training camp and throughout the season, and they don’t come up very often. I can’t tell you the last time that desperado situation came up. …

“It was kind of weird. You’re lined up out there, and I’m used to looking at returners, and instead, I’m looking at Josh Allen. So that was a little different. But it was obviously fun to do it in a winning effort.”

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Had the Bills been in Hail Mary range, Slater and Schooler would have stayed on the sideline. But since the Patriots didn’t believe that even the rocket-armed Allen could reach the end zone from 75 yards out, they rolled out this seldom-used personnel package.

“We knew they were probably going to have some laterals going and keep the ball alive,” Slater said. “It just depends on where the ball is. If the ball’s in Hail Mary range, then it would be a different package out there. If it’s not, then Schools and I are in the game.

“I think (lead defensive coaches) Jerod (Mayo) and Steve (Belichick) saw where the ball was, saw what was happening in the game. They had us ready to go before the situation came up, and when we saw there were four seconds on the clock and the ball was at the 25, they gave us the nod to go in there.”

The Patriots will return to the scene of the Miami Miracle this Sunday as they look to score another upset victory over the heavily favored Dolphins.