Here’s what the Patriots had to say after their 41-33 loss to the Eagles in Super Bowl LII on Sunday:
Tom Brady, quarterback
On losing receiver Brandin Cooks: “He’s one of our best players. Any time you lose a great player, it’s tough. Frustrating to lose him. He was very disappointed, but that’s football.”
On if he’ll return next season: “I expect to be back. It’s 15 minutes after the game ended, so I would like to process this. I don’t see why I wouldn’t be back.”
On what will stick with him about this game: “Like I said, we had opportunities to, I thought, take control. We just didn’t. We did a great job in the first half. We moved the ball a lot, didn’t score a lot of points. We did a better job in the second half, had a chance. Those guys made a play.”
On the sack strip: “I’d obviously love to not have it stripped from me. I was just holding the ball trying to get it downfield. Those guys had a good rush. They made a good play. They made a good play at the right time. They made one good play at the right right time.
Rob Gronkowski, tight end
On Brady: “Tom’s a legend. Fighting all day long, throwing (for) 500 yards, every touchdown. We keep on fighting until the end and we did. We went to all 60 minutes, but it wasn’t enough. We didn’t capitalize on all the opportunities we had and we’ve got to give them credit. They played good and they beat us.”
On playing without Cooks: “Cooks is a great player that definitely makes great plays and he would’ve been great to have but we just had to keep spreading the ball around to the running backs, wide receivers, tight ends. I felt like we did a good job of that, moving the ball, but we just didn’t capitalize on every opportunity.”
Eric Rowe, defensive back
On when he knew he would starti: “It wasn’t official until kickoff.”
On if he thought cornerback Malcolm Butler could have helped the defense: “Yeah, we could have used anybody. Whoever the coaches throw in, obviously, we have full confidence in them to affect the game. We could have used anybody.”
Danny Amendola, wide receiver
On the Hail Mary at the end of the game: “The ball rattled around a couple of times. I lost it. I don’t even know if it hit the ground. I saw it and didn’t come up with it.”
On how hard it would be to lose offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels: “He’s an amazing coach. He gets his players to play hard, and he’s smart, creative. He makes work fun every day so I love playing for him.”
On the high scoring game: “Ultimately, we play to win the game, and we didn’t win the game, so we are awfully disappointed by that.”
On his emotions after losing the Super Bowl: “It’s the nature of the business. It’s a couple minutes after the game, we’re all disappointed. The fact that we lost and we’ve got to find a way to win the game.”
Devin McCourty, cornerback
On if this one of the toughest losses: “We didn’t make a lot of plays. We had a chance to make a play at the end. It’s disappointing.”
On why they couldn’t stop the Eagles: “Both offenses just moved the ball up and down. We looked back and it was third down. I don’t know what happened at the finish, but we just couldn’t get off the field on third down. It was just man-to-man coverage. They kept making plays. We just didn’t do a good job on third down.”
Malcom Brown, defensive lineman
On the defensive problems: “ I don’t really know how to answer that question right now.”
On Eagles quarterback Nick Foles’ performance: “He’s the same guy we saw on tape. He played a good game. He capitalized on more plays than we did and we came up short in the end.”
On the defense not getting off the field on third downs: “There were a lot of problems. We weren’t stopping the run like we wanted to. They basically ran their offense like they wanted to and we just have to do better.”
About the Author
