#StayCovered Defensive Play of the Game: Patriots' dominant run defense

FOXBOROUGH — Instead of singling out one particular defensive play this week, it’s New England’s dominant run defense as a whole that deserves to take a bow for the performance Sunday against the Dolphins.

After three weeks where the Patriots’ run defense was pretty much manhandled — coming into Sunday, New England had allowed an average of 143.3 rushing yards per game, 31st in the league — the Patriots were stout against Miami. The Dolphins, who averaged 98.7 rushing yards per contest prior to Sunday, were shut down to the tune of 56 yards on the ground. Frank Gore had 41 yards on 11 carries, the only member of the Miami running game to hit double-digits in yardage.

Overall, it marked New England’s best regular-season outing against the run since last December 11, when they held the Dolphins to 25 yards on the ground in a 27-20 loss in Miami.

 



“We stopped the run,” said defensive end Deatrich Wise flatly, “and stopped the pass.”

“We really didn’t anticipate getting out-physicaled like the way we did,” said Miami coach Adam Gase. “We just couldn’t get anything going. We were getting pushed back (and there was) a lot of pressure on Ryan (Tannehill), even though they weren’t pressuring with blitzes. So when you’re getting pressured on three, four-man rushes, that’s going to be an issue. And that’s really what happened.”

The difference for New England this time around, as opposed to the last two weeks? Without benefit of a rewatch, there were three things that really stood out:

One, the big bodies up front — Danny Shelton, Lawrence Guy and Malcom Brown — all did well when it came to occupying blockers, moving when needed and just muddying the waters for the Miami run game. Their ability to slow things down made things easier for the linebackers to make plays.

Two, the return of Trey Flowers also made things easier for the guys up front. The Patriots pass rusher provided an excellent burst off the edge, and the fact the Dolphins had to account for his presence on every play (as opposed to last week against the Lions and much of the game two weeks ago against the Jaguars) made it tougher to hold off the interior guys.

And three, it also helped that the Patriots played excellent complementary football for really the first time all year. New England took a sizable lead out the gate, which forced the Dolphins to lean on their passing game in an attempt to try and get back into it. And it’s always easier to try and slow down a one-dimensional offense.