Mistakes a huge factor in the Patriots win

Photo from Bleacher Report

Turnovers were a big part of the Patriots game tonight, as they coughed the ball up 3 times in the first half, which led to 17 Denver points in the first half. Stevan Ridley, Lagarrette Blount and Tom Brady all coughed the ball up in a disastrous first half for the Pats, which saw them go down 24-0 at the break.

But it was the Broncos who made some crucial mistakes in the 2nd half. Peyton Manning threw an interception that led to a Patriots touchdown and Montee Ball fumbled the ball that was recovered by Brandon Spikes, and that also led to a Pats touchdown.And then, of course, there was the Broncos special teams not being able to get out of the way of an overtime punt, which set up Stephen Gostowski's game-winning field goal.

Look, the Patriots won because they were able to take advantage of the Broncos turnovers. Part of that had to do with the fact that Bill Belichick's halftime talk clearly knocked some sense into the Patriots and the offense stopped turning the ball over. And the defense really stepped it up in the 2nd half, getting stop after stop and shutting down the Bronco's top receiving threats for the most part. And that had a spillover effect on the offense, and that formula allowed the Patriots to engineer one of the great comebacks in their history.

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