Following their victory over the Ravens, the Patriots said
Mike Vrabel, head coach
Regarding how a victory like this helped us advance to the playoffs: "I think it was good to be in a game like this where we battled, and it was tied, and we got down, and momentum kind of shifted the other way, then our guys battled back." We were stopped. The attack by the offense persisted. Our quarterback struggled. Both the runners and our receivers performed well. I felt like it was a big team win. It's a great victory for the team.
After being in the same situation as the previous week, on the winning touchdown drive: "I think you learn from that and again, you still have opportunities." We were under siege, but we managed to pull off a play. Therefore, I believe that you can learn from those things, and hopefully we learned from last week's events and our capacity to perform under pressure. The ball security and our capacity to hammer it out were the only topics we discussed for the whole week. I believed that we occasionally tried and received a few. I believe we discussed the possibility of obtaining turnovers.
On WR Stefon Diggs' performance in tonight's game: "We talk about opportunities this whole year, and you know somebody, that receiving room, and I get the nature of the receivers in this league. I understand. I've been around this league for a while, and they all want the ball. That's what they are supposed to do. When they don't get it, they have to understand that they will get it. He took advantage of his opportunities, came through with contested catches, third-down conversions. It was great to see."
On Drake Maye's performance: "I just thought gritty. I mean he got hit. He got hit. They pressured him, or they got home when they didn't. He just kept getting up and battling. He didn't flinch. I think it was important for all of us to have that game, the entire team."
After losing quarterback Lamar Jackson, did they alter how they defended the Ravens' offense? "They are talented." They still have talented players. The offensive remained almost unchanged. We were attempting to obtain pauses. We also lost guys. We lost a lot of guys, but we didn't lose an MVP. We are aware of Lamar Jackson's talent. Nevertheless, they managed to pull off a few plays on us. Give a lot of credit to Tyler [Huntley]. He's a wonderful child. Having spent some time with him in Cleveland, he's an excellent quarterback. The entire game was undoubtedly difficult.
QB Drake Maye
On the game-winning drive: "I'm so proud of this team. It took everybody. That's what we knew coming into it. Our goal this week was to win together, and it was together. It felt good to get that one. Just props to these guys. [We] keep fighting. We had guys going down, guys coming in taking more plays than they probably have ever had, and guys getting tired from pushing through and defense stepping up, making big plays and forcing fumbles. We talked about things all week, and we hit some of them. Obviously, there are some things that I'd like to have back, but right now, it feels good to get a win."
On new and different experiences for him tonight: "Just being down. I felt like we've been up a lot and playing with a lead a lot this whole season. Just being down in the fourth quarter and having a must-need touchdown drive, that feeling is good. Seeing guys left and right and new faces in the huddle. I'm not sure how many different people we had in the huddle out of 11. We probably had 100 combinations. I wasn't even blinking an eye with whoever came in the huddle."
Stefon Diggs, wide receiver
"It was a great ball," he said after making his fourth down catch in the fourth quarter. You know, I tried to speed up the database by running a route. Drake [Maye] placed it so that only I could access it. The database attempted to discredit it. I attempted to put my hands out because I felt he was going to play through the man, and that's precisely what happened. Drake had a fantastic ball.
On how confident they were getting the ball back with five minutes to go: "We were confident even when stuff wasn't looking as good. That's a great football team. You know, it's a four-quarter game, and that's a really good defense out there. But I don't care who we were playing, I feel like we grind hard and we'll get the win. We've got a great head coach and we're all meshing at the right time."
The CB Gonzalez, Christian
Regarding playing complementary football and making turnovers: "It was huge. We spent the entire week discussing the idea of hammering out the ball and removing it from those men. We knew we had to get the turnovers because they are an excellent squad, both offensively and generally. The team needs turnover, so we've been emphasizing that all week. Jaylinn Hawkins and "KC" (K'Lavon Chaisson) both delivered punches, and we're happy they did so at crucial times."
On making plays in the fourth quarter: "I feel like, as a DB, you kind of always feel like that. You always feel like you have to make a play. You want to make a play, because life as a DB, as you know, if you make a play, everybody sees it. If you don't make a play, everybody sees it. Just the team and the guys trusting us to go out there and make plays, and whoever's in the DB room that makes the play, and it happened to be me on that play. But, there's plenty of other plays that all of us have made, and we love making those plays."
On what changed for the Patriots defense when Jackson went out: "Everybody knows what Lamar [Jackson] brings, but [Tyler] Huntley coming in, he's not just no slap quarterback. He's in the NFL, and he's played for a while and done it. A couple of guys, we got to see him last year, so we kind of knew him a little bit, but it didn't really change our game plan or mindset or anything when Lamar went out. It was whoever steps out there as quarterback, as a defense, we want to disrupt them and get off the field."
LB K'Lavon Chaisson
Regarding his fourth-quarter punchout: "Yes, we worked on it all week." We placed a lot of emphasis on getting the ball out. Although we are aware that they had a few speed skaters on their side, the ball managed to escape from their body. Clearly, it's time for us to put on a play.
Regarding his definition of "speed skaters," he stated: "If you ever watch a speed skater and their body, it's how a couple of their ball carriers move with the ball because the ball just gets very loose from their body." Therefore, we were aware of that potential before to the game."
On if they focused on punch outs in practice this week: "We emphasized turnovers and it was in our gameplan throughout the week, was finding a way to get turnovers. Like I said, a couple of their ball carriers, the ball can get loose from their body, and we were able to get some balls out today."
On what clicked for the offense in the fourth quarter: "We just all came together. We knew what we had to do. We made a few mistakes a couple drives before that, so we knew what we had to do. Just tighten up, limit the mistakes and go down and score some points."
