New England Patriots Back In Super Bowl After AFC Title Game Upset Of Kansas City Chiefs

Prior to the AFC Championship game New England Patriots’ wide receiver Julian Edelman dared the team’s critics to ‘bet against us’. His quip turned out to be extremely prescient—the Patriots are returning to the Super Bowl for the third straight year following their overtime victory over the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday. Edelman was reacting to the Patriots’ status as +3 point NFL betting underdogs and the team reportedly used that as some form of motivation in preparing for the AFC title game matchup against Kansas City. If that’s the case, it definitely worked. Rex Burkhead scored on a two yard run with 10:08 remaining in overtime as the Patriots beat the Chiefs 37-31.

Linesmakers had unintentionally raised the ire of the Patriots and their fans by virtue of installing them as road underdogs for the AFC Championship game. The last time that a New England team took points with Brady under center was in Week 2 of the 2015 season against the Buffalo Bills. The last time the Patriots were an underdog during the NFL playoffs was in January 2014 when they lost to the Denver Broncos on the road. Statistically, it made sense as the Patriots had struggled on the road this year. This season they were as dominant as ever at Gillette Stadium going 9-0 SU/7-2 ATS at home. Throw in last season, and they’re on a 16-0 SU/13-3 ATS run at home with a winning margin of approximately 15 points per game. They’ve done well on the road overall in recent years with a last three year record heading into Sunday’s game of 18-6 SU and 16-8 ATS. Prior to their victory over the Chiefs, New England was a woeful 3-5 SU/ATS away from their home stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts. Every road loss came to a team that didn’t make the playoffs this season.

The crux of the Patriots’ road struggles this season was a diminished offensive output away from home. For the 2018 regular season, the Patriots averaged a paltry 21.6 points per game on the road. This represented the lowest PPG output of Brady’s career and the #18 road PPG total in the NFL. The Patriots also had one of only two double digit home PPG vs. road PPG differentials in the National Football league. New England scored an average of 12.2 fewer PPG on the road than at home. That’s the second worst in the NFL ahead of only the Oakland Raiders (13.4 home v. road scoring differential).

None of that really matters now. The Patriots are back in the Super Bowl for the third straight season and the fourth time in the past five years. Their postseason superlatives are staggering. They’re only the third franchise to play in three consecutive Super Bowls. Head coach Bill Belichick now has 30 playoff victories, more than coaching legends Bill Walsh and Don Shula combined. Should New England emerge victorious from Super Bowl LIII it will be the franchise’s sixth under Belichick which will top the combined five won by Walsh and Shula. It will be the Patriots’ 11th overall appearance in the Super Bowl including a losing effort in 1996 under head coach Bill Parcells. They also appeared in Super Bowl XX where they played the role of the New Jersey Generals for the 1985 Chicago Bears—arguably the single greatest team in NFL history. The forthcoming game will be the 9th appearance under Belichick.

At this point, New England will have to find some other motivation for Super Bowl LIII besides their status as an underdog. Most sportsbooks opened the NFC Champion Los Angeles Rams as a -1 point favorite but that price was quickly met with a tsunami of Patriots money to move the number as high as Patriots -2. At press time, the Super Bowl betting line has settled in a bit with New England a -1 -123 favorite. Takeback on the Rams is +1 +103 and the total is set at 58 (Over -105, Under -115).