FOXBOROUGH — Tom Brady and the Patriots do an outstanding job rallying from behind. They’ve been getting plenty of practice.
Now that the Patriots have clinched home-field advantage throughout the AFC playoffs by scoring the final 49 points in a 49-21 win over the Bills yesterday, they know it will be much harder to recover from a poor start.
“Every team in the playoffs is good,” Patriots linebacker Jerod Mayo said. “To be honest, it would be tough to come back against them if we’re behind 21-0.”
Tough, but not impossible. Not with Brady leading the attack.
He finished the regular season with the second most yards passing in NFL history, 5,235, after throwing for 338. Drew Brees, who last week broke Dan Marino’s record of 5,084, added 389 yesterday for the Saints and ended with 5,486.
The Patriots (13-3) have won their last eight games. But for the third week in a row, they fell behind early.
The Bills (6-10) scored touchdowns on their first three possessions, drawing boos from the home fans. That changed to a steady stream of cheers as the Patriots dominated the next three quarters, scoring on seven of their next eight possessions.
“I’d love to be able to see what it looks like when we put together 60 great minutes of football,” Brady said. “Today was 45, but it was better than 30 last week.”
And they won both games, a much more important achievement than surpassing 5,000 yards.
“I play this game for one reason and that’s to win,” Brady said. “I love winning and that helps me sleep at night.”
The Bills took a 21-0 lead in the first quarter on a 4-yard run by Tashard Choice and Ryan Fitzpatrick’s passes of 18 yards to Stevie Johnson and 15 yards to C.J. Spiller.
Johnson was penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct when he lifted his jersey to reveal a T-shirt with the words “Happy New Year.” After that, he was benched by coach Chan Gailey.
Brady threw two touchdowns to Rob Gronkowski, who set the single-season record for tight ends with 1,327 yards receiving.