Moments after his team made NFL history with a thrilling 38-35 victory over the Giants, Patriots head coach Bill Belichick walked around the locker room repeating "48 hours men, 48 hours."
That's the amount of time he's allowing his players to enjoy the first 16-0 season in league history. In fact, Belichick stopped himself every time he almost used the words "perfect season" during what, by his standards, was an emotional postgame news conference.
"I'm happy. I'm happy," said Belichick, who seemed a bit surprised by his own words. "You work all year to try and win every game, and to win them all is great, and I'm very happy about it."
Minutes earlier, you could actually hear shouting coming from the Patriots' locker room. A few players tried to play down the significance of the moment, but most of them seemed incredibly relieved.
Asked to describe the postgame celebration, cornerback Asante Samuel said, "It was like the Boston Red Sox popping champagne bottles except that we didn't have any bottles."
Added running back Laurence Maroney: "It will be a wonderful memory."
Maroney was in the middle of pouring out his heart to Hashmarks when a misguided member of the Patriots' PR staff explained a team policy that "no interviews can take place outside the locker room."
This led to a confrontation that resulted in the Patriots staffer giving Maroney an awkward man hug. But enough about me.
Belichick was so moved by the experience of winning in the stadium where he cut his teeth as an NFL assistant that he invoked the name of his mentor, Bill Parcells. He used the moment to clarify why he doesn't believe in silly ideas such as resting his starters once home-field advantage in the playoffs has been secured.
"There's a coach that I used to work for who used to say, 'There are no meaningless games when you're playing in them.'"
Then our pal Don Banks of SI.com asked something about the salary cap era, which reminded Belichick to stop displaying human characteristics.
"I don't know about that," he grunted.
Then he provided a helpful list of negatives from Saturday's game.
"I don't think that was our best football game out there today," he said. "I think there are a lot of things that we can do better. Start with me, I think that we can do a better job all across the board. The Giants are a good football team, don't get me wrong. But there are things that we can do a better job of and hopefully the next time we play we will have those things improved."
And it's a fair point when you think about it. The next time the Patriots go 16-0, I'd like to see them do it a little cleaner. Trailing by 12 points in a game had to be a humiliating experience for the organization.
The most comical moment of the news conference came when someone asked Belichick about Randy Moss' 65-yard touchdown catch a play after he wasn't able to come up with the ball on what appeared to be the same route. Belichick spent the next two minutes explaining how the two play-calls were nothing alike, and the reporter was later spotted crawling back to the press box.
Moss explained that the second play was designed to go to Wes Welker, who shredded the Giants for 11 catches and 122 yards.
"The corner and the safety trapped Wes and tried to trap Tommy into throwing the ball there to get picked off," said Moss, "but Tommy made a good read, all 11 guys executed the play, and I think that's really what jump-started the second half."
In case you just joined us at 2 a.m. ET, Moss broke the season record for touchdown catches (23) and Brady broke the season record for touchdown passes.
"It's the God's honest truth, I never thought about it or tried to play any differently than what I've always tried to do," Brady said. "It's just try to find the open guy and get him the ball."
Apparently Moss and Brady have agreed to joint custody of the history-making football. One reporter even mentioned cutting the ball in half.
"To be honest, I suggested that," Moss said. I really did. Tommy was telling me, 'No, you keep it.' Well, we both did it. I give my kids one half, and you give your son the other half. I really don't know what we're going to do with the ball."
Don't you love how Moss is the only guy allowed to call his quarterback "Tommy?"
It indicates they have something the rest of us will never quite understand. Giants officials are desperately trying to kick me out of the press box, but I'm refusing to leave.
Wonder what my chances are of catching a cab into the city at this point? I may just cross the New Jersey turnpike by foot and see if I can grab a room at the Sheraton.
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