slides: 5 Takeaways From the Patriots Loss to Philadelphia

Monday, December 07, 2015

Joe Calabro, GoLocalWorcester Sports Team

The New England Patriots (10-2) fell 35-28 to the (5-7) Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday evening at Gillette Stadium. The Patriots have now dropped two straight games, blowing 14 point leads in both games.

"Just overall we obviously didn’t do anything well enough today. Didn’t do enough on offense, turned the ball over, gave up two third-down touchdowns on defense, didn’t play well in the kicking game, just really didn’t do anything well enough to really win. We competed and sort of had a chance there at the end to come back, but when you give up 21 points when your defense isn’t on the field, you lose about 98 percent of those games. We’ve just got to get back to work, got to do a better job," said Patriots head coach Bill Belichick after the game.

See the Five Takeaways Slideshow Below

The game was tied at 14 in the second half with the Patriots in possession. New England drove into the red zone before Tom Brady tried to fit a pass into Danny Amendola but it was tipped and intercepted by Malcolm Jenkins who returned it 100 yards for a touchdown.

"The first interception was bad quarterbacking. The team trusts you to put the ball in your hands and make good decisions with it, and that was a terrible decision. So it's unfortunate because those cost you the game, and I've got to do a better job," said Tom Brady after the game.

The following Patriots possession they were forced to punt. Darren Sproles received the punt and took it 83 yards to put the Eagles up 28-14 with four minutes left in the third quarter.

New England scored two touchdowns in the final five minutes to get within one score but could not convert on a final possession.

New England had a 14 point lead, 14-0, of their own in the first half before Philly tied the game on a punt block as time expired in the half.

The Leaders

Tom Brady finished 29 of 56 for 312 yards, three touchdowns and two interceptions in the game.

James White led all receivers with 10 receptions for 115 yards.

Next up

The Patriots return to action on Sunday, December 13 when they visit the Houston Texans. The game has been flexed to the Sunday Night game.

See the Five Takeaways Slideshow Below

Related Slideshow: 5 Takeaways From the Patriots Loss to the Eagles

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Tom Brady

During the game, Brady passed Dan Marino for third place on the all-time passing touchdown list and has 30 on the season.

That was about the only thing that went right Brady who was once again hit numerous times and threw two interceptions, one of which was returned 100 yards to the end zone.

Brady finished the game with three touchdowns and two interceptions and 312 yards passing.

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Onside Drop Kick??

The Patriots took a 14-0 lead on a catch by Danny Amendola.

On the ensuing kick off, the Patriots decided to go with an onside drop kick, yes, an onside drop kick, which they did not recover, really didn't come all that close.

Philly ended up with grea field position and scored on the following drive, completely changing the momentum of the game.

Philly went on to score 35 straight points.

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End of Half

For the second week in a row, the Patriots got the ball back before the half with plenty of time to drive down for a score and for the second week in a row, they played it super conservative.

New England got the ball back with 1:32 to play with time outs and they ran the ball three times, Brady was sacked once and then there was an incomplete pass through the hands of Chandler.

After playing conservative, the Patriots punted and the punt was blocked and Philly ran it in for a score, tying the game at 14 before the half.

The offense is banged up, no question, but there is plenty of weapons to do better than that.

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Unspecial Teams

Bill Belichick said during the week that the Eagles special teams is the best they have seen all season and it proved to be correct.

The eagles returned a punt for a touchdown and blocked a field goal and returned that for a touchdown.

Matthew Slater got hurt early in the game but did return.

The Patriots special teams are usually never a concern, in this game, they were a big issue.

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Two in a row

The Patriots have now dropped two straight games after winning 10 straight.

New England has also blown 14 points leads in back to back games, in fairness, this 14 point lead was in the first quarter, not the fourth like last week.

The two losses now put New England in danger of losing the number one seed and also in danger of falling out of a bye week.

New England plays Houston next week.