The 2001 Patriots didn’t just win a Super Bowl, they changed what it meant to be a fan in Boston
· Yahoo Sports
The Patriots weren’t going to win. Of course they weren’t.
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By reaching Super Bowl XXXVI in New Orleans, New England had helped expunge the bad feelings that lingered after Bill Parcells’ abandonment, Pete Carroll’s failure, Curtis Martin jumping ship and all the baloney about shopping for groceries.
But hooked up to a polygraph, most Boston fans would have admitted they didn’t expect to win. This was a time when the Curse of the Bambino still felt like a real thing and Duck Boat Parades hadn’t been conceived of yet. We’d been conditioned to ready ourselves for inevitable failure.
That’s important to remember when the 2001 Patriots are honored on Sunday, when New England hosts the Raiders at Gillette Stadium.
The Patriots had reached the Super Bowl twice before, but just getting there had been the pinnacle of the New England football experience.
They were crushed by the Super Bowl Shufflin’ 1985 Bears. Looking back, after the Bears won 46-10, it seems crazy that the Patriots were only a 10-point underdog going into that game. They didn’t really threaten the heavily-favored Packers in Super Bowl XXXI either and fell 35-21.
The lead-up to both of those games was fun and the outcome wasn’t really surprising and Super Bowl XXXVI looked like more of the same.
The Patriots were a fun little underdog story. Their name and red, white and blue uniforms made them sentimental favorites in the aftermath of 9/11. But the Rams were the so-called “Greatest Show on Turf” and a 14-point favorite.
This was before we knew about Tom Brady. And back then, the Patriots’ crusty former Browns coach was clearly doing a good job, but Bill Belichick had yet to establish himself as the gameplan wizard that he’d become.
And back then, other than the Celtics, Boston teams weren’t expected to win. The Bruins had gone almost 30 years without lifting a Stanley Cup. The Red Sox’ World Series failures over 80+ years had become mythic. And the Patriots? They’d been a punchline far more than they’d been a contender.
The idea of winning a championship was so foreign that after their gut-wrenching loss to the Mets in the 1986 World Series, the city of Boston threw the Red Sox a parade. Just days after they lost Games 6 and 7 in gut-wrenching fashion, the Red Sox were honored.
In 2001, Boston held an event at City Hall Plaza to honor Ray Bourque for winning a Stanley Cup championship for another team.
Those would never happen today.
Even including the Celtics, of cities with teams in all four major American sports leagues, only Philadelphia had gone longer than Boston without winning a championship when the 2001 NFL season started.
Disappointment was simply part of being a New England sports fan. Before all the “They hate us, cause they ain’t us” bluster that would follow over the next two decades, America by and large actually felt bad for Boston.
The 2001 Patriots changed that.
That team unlocked New England’s ability to believe and to hope, setting the stage for 13 championships across four sports in the 25 years that followed.
The absence of Tom Brady and Bill Belichick will be noticeable. Brady, despite being a Raiders part owner now, is broadcasting another game somewhere else. Belichick will be trying to build off North Carolina’s upset win over No. 25 Pitt.
But they don’t need to be there. Belichick’s grudge against the Patriots would make him a distraction that overshadowed everything else and Brady doesn’t need the recognition. He’s got the statue under the lighthouse and thousands of fans still wear his jersey every Sunday.
They were the two biggest pieces of that team’s success but hardly the only two. This is a chance to celebrate Ty Law, Richard Seymour, Adam Vinatieri and so many other players who were the foundation of the dynasty and helped change New England forever.
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