PHOENIX — At the end of a sleepless night, three-time Super Bowl MVP Tom Brady was still soaking in the magnitude of his historic fourth Lombardi Trophy with the New England Patriots.
“I was a young kid when we won those first three. I know in ’04 I was like ‘we need this to be over, the offseason to start.’ With the perspective of that game, it’s a hard thing to get here and it’s harder to win it.”
Brady threw his fourth touchdown pass with 2:02 left and watched as Russell Wilson drove the Seahawks to the Patriots 1-yard line. Had cornerback Malcolm Butler not intercepted Wilson with 20 seconds left, Brady would have likely been waking up Monday with a third consecutive Super Bowl loss.
“He’s been doing it to me in practice all season,” Brady said. “I was glad to see him pick somebody else off.”
Brady set records with 20 first-half completions and 37 in the game. He also set the Super Bowl mark for the largest second-half comeback overcome — 10 points — and career touchdown passes (13). Brady was 13 of 15 with two touchdown passes in the fourth quarter.
“I love doing it, so I don’t want it to end anytime soon,” he said when asked just how much longer he can continue.
“A lot of decisions that I make in my life are about how to sustain it, and that takes a commitment in and of itself. ‘You’ve got to put it in the bank,’ as coach (Bill Belichick) always says. It’s there when you need it.”
“He competes as well as any player I’ve ever coached,” Belichick said. “He is the guy that fights to the end. Competes to the end. There’s no player I respect more for that than Tom. That’s been a great pillar for our team the last decade and a half.”
Because the Patriots follow Belichick’s lead of high expectations, Brady said it was easy to believe in one another. From the team’s loss at Kansas City, when Belichick was asked if he needed to evaluate the quarterback position, to late in the fourth quarter Sunday night.
“We’ve been on the other end of this two times with late leads,” Brady said. “Being on our 1-yard line with 20 seconds left, but our guys never gave up.”
Belichick said Brady deserves all accolades he receives as the team’s leader.
Brady said he doesn’t want his career to end any time soon, but he’s not playing to raise his legacy.
“I’ve never thought much about that,” Brady said. “I’m still in the midst of my career. Probably the most gratifying thing is to win the game and celebrate with your team and loved ones.”
The last trip to Arizona for a Super Bowl was spoiled by the New York Giants, who beat the Patriots in the same stadium on a drive with two highlight catches. The most memorable was David Tyree’s leaping grab when he pinned the ball against his helmet and held on with safety Rodney Harrison closing in.
When Wilson hit Jermaine Kearse on a juggling catch Kearse made on his back, Brady said he wasn’t watching and didn’t see it happen. When he saw the replay on the end-zone Jumbotron, Brady said it was the first time in the game he doubted the Patriots would win.
“When things didn’t go right, they just rolled up their sleeves and went back to work,” Belichick said. “Last night, for me, was reflective of what I saw all year from our players and our coaching staff.”
Commissioner Roger Goodell introduced Brady and presented him the MVP trophy before the two briefly posed for a photo. Brady quickly moved toward the podium and said “it was a long night.”
“We’re thrilled to have the Patriots here this morning,” Goodell said. “One of those games that demonstrated the resilience that make the NFL special and make this team special.”
Brady was asked about Deflategate and his legacy, but said he isn’t focused on the investigation.
Overnight ratings reflect Super Bowl XLIX was the highest-rated game in history.
“Undoubtedly [it] will be the most viewed Super Bowl,” Goodell said. “I would love to thank all the people of Arizona for their hospitality. Everything went incredibly smoothly for our fans.”
Back when the Pats were pounded by the Chiefs, it didn’t look like the Patriots were of Super Bowl caliber.
But for Belichick that was the moment when his team began to show the character and spirit that led them to Sunday’s triumph.
The Patriots had suffered a surprise defeat to AFC East divisional rivals the Miami Dolphins in week one and the loss to the Chiefs in September set off plenty of talk about whether the Belichick-Brady era was coming to a close.
The Chiefs ran out 41-14 winners that Monday night but Belichick saw a sign of what was to come.
“I’d say the turning point for me this season was halftime of the Kansas City game. Obviously it didn’t go well and we weren’t in any position to win the game, but at the end of the game, in the second half, I thought our team played as hard as they could play,” he said.
“When we got some other things straightened out and improved, we got better results, such as the following week in Cincinnati.
“I thought that at the time it was a challenge to the team at halftime (at Kansas City), and they responded. That was a key moment.”
The Patriots won their next seven games and ended the season with just two more defeats.
There were no simple personnel or strategy changes that explained the turnaround, the coach said.
“I don’t think there was any big revelation. It was a day by day, practice period by practice period process where we just all worked harder to get better and fix the things that didn’t go well in both the coaching and the playing standpoint.
“It’s a long process. We got better on a consistent basis throughout the course of the year. Last night was a finished product.”
Belichick was also fulsome in praise of Brady, his quarterback who threw four touchdowns on Sunday and was named the game’s most valuable player.