FOXBOROUGH – It’s premature to say the Titans toppled a dynasty at Gillette Stadium Saturday night.
But they showcased their bruiser birthday running back as they dethroned the champions with an imperfect game, advancing to a matchup in Baltimore to renew a once violent rivalry. They won a wild card playoff game for the second time in three seasons.
And that’s plenty.
“We’ve been on the other side of it,” said Logan Ryan, who won two Super Bowls with the Patriots but was part of the 2017 Titans who lost here in the divisional round. “The whole thing was you can’t get caught looking at the pinstripes. They are a championship organization, they are all class, they’ve got the best quarterback, the best coach.
“But we were just trying to win the game. Mike (Vrabel) preached that to the team, he brought a team of believers up here.”
Vrabel won three Super Bowls in eight seasons playing for Bill Belichick and the Patriots. Given a chance to say the game meant something to him because of all that, he pointed to his team now.
“I’m honored to coach these guys,” he said, “And there is no other team that I would rather have come in here with than the one that was out there on the field. I’m thankful I get to coach them another week.”
As they did in a regular-season win over the Patriots in Nashville last season, the Titans shut out the Patriots in the second half.
Their 14-13 intermission lead expanded to 20-13 only when Ryan grabbed Brady’s last pass of the season and took if back 9-yards for a pick 6 with 9 seconds remaining in the game.
The Patriots head into the offseason having lost to all four of the AFC’s remaining teams Tennessee, Houston, top-seeded Baltimore and No. 2 seed Kansas City.
Tom Brady is set to become a free agent for the first time in his career and the 42-year old is no lock to be back.
When the Titans and Patriots practiced together during training camp and we saw just how close he and Vrabel are and when the Titans own quarterback situation was so up in the air, I thought a Nashville pairing of the two might be a real possibility.
But Ryan Tannehill is 10 years younger, and his excellent season once he took over for Marcus Mariota in Week 7 lines him up to be the guy now. Saturday he will have to do more next week in Baltimore to lead the Titans to the AFC Championship Game.
Against the Patriots, he threw just 15 times, hitting on eight for 72 yards with a bad pick and a touchdown to Firkser. After posting an incredible regular season 9.6 yards per attempt, he managed 4.8 against the league’s top defense.
“We knew coming in that we wanted to run the football,” Tannehill said. “Obviously (that’s) a really good defense, good in the secondary and they make it tough on you throwing the football.
“I don’t know if we knew we were going to throw it that little, but they definitely did a good job and the run game was working for us so we stuck with it.”
Tannehill’s passer rating of 61.0 was still better than Brady’s 59.4, dragged down by 17 incomplete passes on 37 attempts.
“It’s unreal, I can’t lie,” Jurrell Casey said. “To go against the GOAT, to get him riled up, not let him complete passes like he normally does all day, it feels great. It’s definitely a good motivator for this defense.”
Henry turned 35 touches into 204 yards in a game where no other skill player on either side managed more than 76 (James White) and no other Titan had more than 23 (Anthony Firkser).
“We don’t want anything easy,” said Henry, who turned 26. “We want it gritty, we want it dirty. That’s the mentality we’ve got to have. My main focus is finishing each and every drive in all three phases.
“Don’t give up on each other, believe, communicate when we’re out there, what we’re seeing so we make adjustments as a team. Just keep thriving, keep striving and finish the game.”
The Patriots were in a position to go up 14-7 in the second quarter with a first-and-goal from the Titans’ 1. But the Titans turned them away with an excellent goal-line stand.
Rashaan Evans shot through the line to get Sony Michel for a 1-yard loss on first down, DaQuan Jones moved laterally to get Rex Burkhead after just a 1-yard gain on second down and on third down Jeffrey Simmons blew things up to allow Evans another play on Michel, this one for a 2-yard loss.
“After that, we had a momentum shift," Evans said.
The Titans turned around and went on a seven-play, 75-yard drive that took just 1:41. WKRN's Cory Curtis has taken to calling it "reinvented 2:00 offense." Henry touched the ball on six plays, five of them runs including a 1-yard TD.
It unconventional, but they're making it work. This time it produced the winning score.
It gave the Titans another game to push for their good-to-great goal. And it sent the left the Patriots into their uncertain future.
“It’s always the same,” New England safety Devin McCourty said of a playoff loss: “It’s like a crash landing.”