What went right for the Pats …
1 Maroney: No. 1 — At long last, Laurence Maroney is consistently looking like the No. 1?RB the Patriots have needed so badly. Their three-game win streak is no coincidence.
2 Loving Gostkowski — K Stephen Gostkowski has had a few issues this season, most notably his third-quarter miss from 40 yards out in last month’s loss at Denver. In all, though, he’s made us forget Adam Vinatieri all over again. A 4-for-4 day yesterday has the Mississippi native at 17-for-20 kicking field goals.
3 Overcoming the injuries — The Pats’ inactive list seems to get longer every game. Yesterday, they were missing WR Julian Edelman, RB Sammy Morris, RB Fred Taylor and DE Jarvis Green, among others. No biggie — at least so far. New England has been handling opponents since the
injury bug really bit.
4 Moss-ome— Randy Moss was great at WR, hauling in six passes for 147 yards. The biggest was a 71-yard TD — Tom Brady’s longest scoring pass of the year.
What went wrong …
1 Gimmicks worked — The Pats won, but they had their trouble with the Dolphins’ fancy sets, giving up TDs on an option run and a Wildcat pass.
2 Barely closing— Miami was in this one too long. The Pats should have put it away after they got the ball with 5:38 to play. Instead, they blew a third down and needed an extra stop to finish it.
3 Key ruling — The Pats could have taken the game over early, but a fumble-return TD by Adalius Thomas was overturned on review. Good thing it wasn’t a playoff game.
