New England Patriots: 3 Lessons learned from Super Bowl 54
3. A top defense can only get you so far
Throughout the course of the 2019 campaign, the New England Patriots contained one of the top defensive units throughout the entire NFL, oftentimes holding opponents in check to allow the offense to ultimately take games over and stretch things out of reach every week.
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That resulted in New England getting off to a hot start to the regular season, winning nine of its first 10 games, to only taper off as the year progressed before exiting the playoffs in the Wild Card Round.
That top-notch defense is something that both the Patriots and the San Francisco 49ers shared in common during basically the entire season, with both teams ranking at or right near the top of the league in multiple defensive categories during the regular season schedule.
With that attribute in common, it should have also shown New England that your defense can only get you so far.
Yes, having a dominant defense has the ability to lift a team to a championship, but the offense also needs to be able to step up and put points up on the scoreboard to take over a game and allow the defense the ability to hold onto a lead.
That was an issue that New England faced more so during the second half of the regular season, and it also was an issue that San Francisco faced that ended its season short of a Super Bowl title.
Going into 2020, it’s certainly a positive that the Patriots will once again contain one of the more dominant defensive squads in the NFL, but until they are able to improve things on the offensive side of the field to be able to take over games, New England will end up having results like San Francisco did in Super Bowl LIV and will come up short more often than not in games.