A Patriots-Rams Super Bowl is going to be fun, we promise

Super Bowl 53 is set. On February 3, the Los Angeles Rams will face the New England Patriots in a rematch of the game that launched Tom Brady to greatness 17 years ago.

The Rams came back to dispatch the Saints in the NFC title game, while the Patriots held off the Chiefs’ comeback efforts to earn their fourth AFC championship in five years. That sets up the rematch of a game from 2002 that took place in a world where the Patriots managed to be a 14-point underdog.

New England won’t be overlooked this time. This year’s Super Bowl will pit a budding, 24 year old quarterback making his first appearance in the big game against a 41 year old making his ninth. Jared Goff will stare down the winningest quarterback in NFL postseason history on February 3, and if he doesn’t blink he could be the one to hoist the Vince Lombardi Trophy at the end of the night.

It may be a familiar narrative to see the Patriots in the Super Bowl for the fourth time in five years. That doesn’t mean there’s a shortage of intriguing storylines to watch.

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Los Angeles was a three-point underdog going into a raucous Superdome, but they withstood an early New Orleans flurry (and noise so loud it rattled the team’s playcalling at the line of scrimmage) to emerge with an overtime win that made Sean McVay the youngest head coach in Super Bowl history. The Rams came back from a 13-0 deficit to prove they can handle adversity, shredding the Saints’ 88.2% win percentage in the process.

In two weeks, they’ll have to prove themselves once more, but this time in the biggest game of the year. Los Angeles will bring a 32-year-old head coach and third-year quarterback into what promises to be a shootout against a powerful opponent with a veteran head coach who has been to the mountaintop before.

Bill Belichick is making his ninth appearance in the Super Bowl as a head coach, and will have the chance to win the eighth ring of his long-spanning NFL career. On Sunday, he found a way to confound the Chiefs to zero first half points and stagger Kansas City’s powerful offense just enough to pull out an overtime win. The Patriots held presumptive 2018 NFL MVP Patrick Mahomes to just 16 completions on 31 pass attempts in the process. No matter what Goff plans for, he’s going to face something unique — and likely painful — in Atlanta.

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Gurley was a first-team All-Pro tailback for the second straight year in 2018, gaining 1,831 yards from scrimmage in 14 games and scoring 21 total touchdowns for one of the league’s most explosive offenses. But on Sunday, he was almost anonymous for Los Angeles — and when he did have his number called, it typically went poorly for the Rams:

Gurley finished his day with four carries, three targets, and 13 total yards. While he added a touchdown before halftime, he was mostly a ghost as his team’s wide receivers rang up one fewer rush than he did. Journeyman C.J. Anderson, an unexpected hero in the Divisional Round, averaged only 2.8 yards per carry but still took the field for more snaps than the man who sits above him on the depth chart.

Gurley wasn’t on the team’s injury report, and Jared Goff told Chris Myers there was no specific reason for the star tailback’s absence:

“You just have to feed off what we are doing,” he said after the game. “And C.J. was running the ball well. I expect Todd to have a hell of a game in the Super Bowl though.”

Gurley was a monster in his first two postseason games, running for 100+ yards in each of them. He struggled in the NFC title game and barely saw the ball as his team prepped for a difficult comeback in enemy territory. The Rams are going to need all their weapons to claim the franchise’s first NFL title since 2000 (and Los Angeles’s first since 1951). Was Sunday’s series of brain farts a signal of things to come? Or just a mere pothole on Gurley’s gilded road to greatness?

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Drew Brees had a subpar showing on his home turf Sunday, needing 40 passes to throw for only 249 yards — a 6.2 yard per attempt average that’s 1.6 yards below his lifetime postseason average. A big part of LA’s defensive success came from a powerful push from the defensive line. The Rams sacked Brees twice but hit him seven more to keep him from getting comfortable in the pocket all afternoon.

That gameplan included the pressure that forced what turned out to be a game-swinging interception in overtime:

Pushing through the Saints’ impressive group of blockers was a boon to Sean McVay’s gameplan. He’ll have to take on an even more intimidating task at the Super Bowl.

New England’s offensive line has peaked at the exact right time to keep Tom Brady upright, allowing the 41-year-old passer to keep his uniform mostly clean through two postseason wins. The Patriots have formed a force field around their five-time world champion quarterback, and rattling him — the strategy the Giants executed to perfection in a pair of Super Bowl wins — may prove to be the Rams’ toughest test of the season. The Chiefs only knocked Brady down once in the AFC title game.

New England shut the Chiefs out in the first half thanks in part to a powerful pass rush that knocked Kansas City out of scoring range once and created 43 negative yards in the first half. While that impact lessened in the second half, the club still managed to hit Mahomes nine times and keep him from getting comfortable in the pocket. This didn’t matter much once Mahomes found his rhythm because he’s capable of doing monster things on the run, but it doesn’t bode well for Jared Goff.

Los Angeles ranked sixth in the league when it came to keeping Goff upright, allowing sacks on just 5.25% of his dropbacks. But the Chiefs came into the AFC title game having posted a 4.6% mark, and defensive coordinator Brian Flores still found a way to exploit that. The third-year quarterback is already going to be dealing with some jitters on the biggest stage of his career; now he’s got to worry about a renewed Patriot pass rush as well.

New England’s recent strategy has relied on establishing its running game early, and the production of James White and rookie Sony Michel have made it work. The Patriots have burned opponents who’ve dared Brady to throw early and often behind efficient runs and a low risk, high reward array of tailback screen passes that effectively wait for opponents to make a mistake and then exploit it.

But that production didn’t hold up against Kansas City’s in-game adjustments, and those diminishing returns helped slow New England’s scoring as the game wore on. This is troubling for the Patriots — they aren’t exactly teeming with can’t-miss targets. While Julian Edelman has been his typically efficient self and White remains one of the league’s most reliable targets out of the backfield, the rest of the New England depth chart effectively dares opponents to throw single coverage against the Pats.

New England still managed to make that work with mid-range routes built to create gaps in tight coverage. Once Kansas City crept close to the line to stop Michel and his cohort, Brady torched them with a litany of quick outs to Edelman and still-got-it tight end Rob Gronkowski. Brady’s final line? 348 passing yards and a touchdown. But he doesn’t get there unless Michel, White, and Rex Burkhead run for 176 yards and four touchdowns as a powerful offensive cantilever.

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