The Washington Commanders will travel north to take on the New England Patriots. Here are five things to know about the Week 9 opponent.
1. They’ve been inconsistent.
The amount of surprise upsets in the league this year have made one clear: if you can’t play your best all four quarters, the game will slip out from under you. Like the Commanders, the Patriots have also failed to put together consistent performances for four quarters each week.
In the Patriots’ previous matchups, they’ve seen a solid start that turns into two-quarters of mistakes and ends scrambling to pull in winning points. In New England’s 31-17 loss to the Miami Dolphins last week, they started with a 24-yard touchdown from Mac Jones to wide receiver Kendrick Bourne. But it quickly turned around when they lost their momentum and gave up three Miami touchdowns.
Offensively, they tried to bounce back but managed just one touchdown. So, while the Patriots can start a game early and may even end one with a fight, they’re not a team that has proven it can finish.
This has similarly been a struggle for the Commanders, although they have shown they can hang with the league’s best teams. They nearly took down the Philadelphia Eagles in both of their matchups with their NFC East rival, and had it not been for a few critical plays, they could have gotten an upset in either one or both games.
“If you can do that for four quarters against an elite team in the NFL, you should be able to do it any time that you want,” said head coach Ron Rivera. “Our focus is we have nine games left to play. We’ll play them one game at a time, and we’ll focus in on what is coming up next.”
The Commanders’ next challenge is outperforming the Patriots and inching one game closer to .500.