Reasons To Lose

The analysis of the Pats 20-18 loss to the Broncos in the AFC Championship game will go on for a long time. So many things went wrong.

The Pats won the coin toss and took the ball to open the game. This was the first time they did this since the first game of the 2008 season against Kansas City. We know how that ended with Tom Brady suffering a season ending knee injury in the opening series of the game.

One of the biggest problems was third down conversion where the Pats were successful on only two of fifteen attempts. That is a recipe for losing a game.

There were a number of other factors involved, including going on fourth down and not taking an easy field goal attempt in the fourth quarter.