As they come out of their bye week, the New England Patriots face what at least at first glance appears to be their most important game of the season when they host their division rivals, the Buffalo Bills at Gillette Stadium Sunday. Few teams could ask to be in a better position than New England, knowing that with a win, they clinch their first AFC East championship since 2019.
Not only would the division title, were the Patriots to win on Sunday, be their first in six years, it would be only the fifth in franchise history with a quarterback not named Tom Brady. In his 18 seasons as the Patriots’ full-time starting quarterback, teams led by Brady failed to capture the division crown just once, in 2002 â Brady’s second season under center.
The Patriots have played 47 seasons behind other quarterbacks prior to this one. They won their division in 1996 and 1997 with former No. 1 overall draft pick Drew Bledsoe under center. They also topped the division in 1986 with Tony Eason starting 14 games and veteran Steve Grogan starting two. And in 1978, Grogan led the Patriots to their first division title of the Super Bowl era.
In 1963, the then-Boston Patriots won the American Football League East Division behind 33-year-old quarterback Babe Parilli.
Patriots Get Even Better News
But that wasnât even the best news the Patriots received about their upcoming clash with Buffalo, a game that will be televised by CBS in the 1 p.m. Eastern time slot, though unfortunately not on a nationwide basis.
According to to Athletic Patriots correspondent Chad Graff, the Patriots can go into the Bills matchup feeling quite secure about their immediate future.
“Everyone knows how important Sundayâs game is. But itâs also worth acknowledging this beforehand,” Graff wrote. “The Pats are still in great shape, even if they lose on Sunday.”
Still a 3-of-4 Chance at Division Title
According to the Athletic‘s own playoff probability formula, which uses 100,000 computer simulations of the remaining games in the season to calculate each team’s chances, the 11-2 Patriots enter the game against the 9-4 Bills with an 89 percent chance of winning the AFC East.
But even if they lose to the Bills on Sunday, they still retain a 75 percent probability of winning the division. In other words, in three of every four scenarios, New England walks away with the division crown, even if the Bills take the victory on Sunday.
Chances at Top Seed Also Decent
Those arenât bad odds for a team that entered the season with modest expectations at best. Though most experts believed that the Patriots would improve on the disastrous 4-13 record they had posted in each of the previous two seasons, oddsmakers had the Patriots over/under for wins set at 8.5, and the Bills, winners of the AFC East five years in a row, were seen as a lock for a sixth.
But thatâs not all of the good news coming out of the Athletic playoff prediction computer model.
The Patriots enter Sundayâs showdown with, according to the computer simulation model, a 65 percent chance of securing the top seed in the AFC and with it, a first-round bye.
A loss to the Bills, of course, reduces those chances considerably â but far from totally. Even by losing, the Patriots hold on to a 30 percent chance of grabbing that top seed, nearly one out of three.
A win bumps their chances up to 64 percent, according to The Athletic‘s formula.
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