This Sunday is the biggest Patriots game since…?

It's been a while since the New England Patriots played in what would widely be considered a 'big' high-stakes football game. That changes on Sunday, when the Patriots host the Buffalo Bills at Gillette Stadium, with a chance to sweep the Bills and clinch their first AFC East title since 2019 - with the Bills having won the division every year since. There are also some other more indirect stakes, such as the Patriots' pursuit of the No. 1 seed in the AFC playoffs as well as quarterback Drake Maye's standing in the MVP race.

So yeah, there's a lot going on this week. Throughout the week leading up to the game it's brought up the question - when is the last time the Patriots played in this big of a game?

Of course, this organization is no stranger to big games with their two-decade run in the 2000s and 2010s. Yet the big game feel has been rare around Foxborough since Tom Brady's departure after the 2019 season. Brady's last game was a playoff loss to the Tennessee Titans on Jan. 4 2020, which can be argued as the last 'big' game the Patriots played in.

What has been the standard for a 'big game' for the Patriots' since that one? Let's take a trip down memory lane and look at some of the contenders for what this game will unseat as the Patriots' "biggest game" since Brady's departure, mainly looking at the hype going into the game rather than what happened in the game itself.

Looking back after making this list, it wasn't intentional for it to be so lopsided with losses - but that's the way things have gone for the Patriots the past few years. Winning a game of this magnitude would represent yet another change under Mike Vrabel's program from the previous half-decade. It's also worth noting that this game should be topped in this category quickly, with a playoff appearance expected in January.

I wanted to try to include at least one game from each season, and while the 2020 year was a true transitional season this is probably as big as a game got that year. The Patriots opened by winning two of their first three games, sandwiching a competitive loss on the final play to what was a high-level Seattle Seahawks team. They then were set to go to Kansas City to play the defending champions on Monday Night Football, and a chance to prove they'd immediately stuck the landing post-Brady.

However, that didn't happen. Late in the week it was announced that Cam Newton had to miss the game due to COVID, and with Jarrett Stidham and Brian Hoyer at quarterback the Patriots lost 26-10. They fell to 2-2, and with a loss the next week never got back to .500 that season.

This game had a big game feel, but not the actual football stakes to go with it. Brady's return certainly was emotional, but ultimately this was an early season game against a non-conference opponent. Brady versus Bill Belichick had historical context, but this wasn't the kind of game that held major implications on the course of the 2021 season.

That being said, it was a good game. The Brady-led Bucs went back and forth with the Mac Jones led Patriots, who actually had a halftime lead. In fitting fashion though Brady led a second half comeback, leading to a go-ahead field goal inside of the two-minute warning. The Patriots had a chance to respond, but a 56-yard attempt from Nick Folk fell short on the rainy night to end the game at 19-17 Tampa.

After a down season in the COVID year, it looked like the Patriots were back. Despite that loss to the Buccaneers that dropped them to 1-3, they went 7-1 in their next eight games. That set up a Monday Night Football showdown with the Bills, who had had a surprisingly slow start to the season, that could give the Patriots a multi-game lead in the AFC East.

It was a windy night in Buffalo with gusts reaching over 50 miles per hour, and the Patriots handled the conditions better than the Bills. Mac Jones threw the ball just three times, as the Patriots ran to a 14-10 victory in a game highlighted by the game planning and in-game adjustment abilities of Bill Belichick.

After that win over Buffalo the Patriots were rolling and the No. 1 seed in the AFC coming off of the bye week. They were playing another likely playoff team in the Indianapolis Colts, on the road an in primetime on a Saturday night. It was a perfect chance to make a statement and kick off their stretch run.

That statement never came. Right out of the gate the Patriots looked flat, and found themselves behind 20-0 early in the third quarter. 17 unanswered points at the start of the fourth quarter closed the gap, but Jonathan Taylor put the final nail in the coffin with a 67-yard touchdown run heading into the two-minute warning. That game kicked off what ended up being a backslide for the Patriots out of the bye that season.

That Week 13 game catapulted the Patriots to the top of the division going into the bye week. The loss to the Colts coming out of the bye wasn't great, but still the Patriots then welcomed Buffalo to Foxborough with a chance to clinch both the playoffs and division title.

But, that's not what happened. Buffalo put up 428 yards of total offense on the way to a 33-21 win. That was highlighted by an 11-catch, 125-yard receiving game from Isaiah McKenzie. The Patriots didn't recover from the backslide either, and ended up losing the division and having to settle for the Wild Card, which brings us to our next game...

After backing into the playoffs as the six seed, the Patriots had a three-match with the Bills in Orchard Park. By nature of it being a playoff game some might point to this as being the 'biggest' game for the Patriots of the post-Brady era, but the hype was tempered due to the Patriots' 1-3 record to close the season out of the bye week, and multiple injury and COVID situations.

That all manifested itself in one of the more lopsided playoff games in recent memory, with the Bills going up and down the field just about at will in a 47-17 game. That is the last time the Patriots played in a playoff game.

This game had some buzz. With Mac Jones hurt the Patriots turned to Bailey Zappe, who won two games to get the Patriots to 3-3. Now Jones was expected to return against fellow 2021 first-round quarterback Justin Fields on Monday Night Football - the first Monday Night game at Gillette in six years. The Patriots were also bringing back their silver pants at home for the first time since making their uniform change two years prior, adding just a little more juice.

It ended up being a memorable game, but not in the ways Patriots fans wanted. Jones did make his return and start, but was pulled after an early interception having thrown just six passes. Zappe threw two more picks of his own and the Patriots failed to contain the Chicago run game, which totaled 243 yards including 82 and a score from Fields. A one-score game at halftime became a 33-14 Bears win, which kicked off a quarterback competition/controversy that lasted the better part of two seasons in New England.

Yet another Bills game makes its way onto this list. Despite once again fading after the bye (the Patriots went 3-5 after their bye week following a 4-1 stretch going into it), the Patriots had a chance to grab a playoff spot with a win in Orchard Park to close out the 2022 season. On the other side, this was the Bills' first game after the Damar Hamlin situation.

Despite the Bills starting the game with a kickoff return touchdown the Patriots managed to hang around, and even gain a brief three point lead in the third quarter. That was followed by the Bills' second kickoff return touchdown of the game and Buffalo never looked back from there, eliminating the Patriots from playoff contention.

The Patriots started the next season by hosting the defending NFC Champion Philadelphia Eagles. After narrowly missing the playoffs the year before hopes were high going into the season with the hire of Bill O'Brien, the free agency additions of JuJu Smith-Schuster and Mike Gesicki, and a draft class highlighted by Christian Gonzalez and Keion White. This game seemed like a good test of where the Patriots were at.

Ultimately it went the way many expected with the Eagles pulling out a close 25-20 win. Mac Jones threw for 316 yards and three scores in his first game with O'Brien. However, it ended up being more of an anomaly than a sign of things to come that season.

Our final game on this list prior to this current season is Drake Maye's first start. After a month of 'will they, won't they' the Patriots turned to their first-round rookie in a home game against a formidable Houston defense. Despite the 1-4 start, this game had many excited to get the first real regular season look at the player expected to represent the future of the organization.

Maye showed a little bit of everything in this game, going 20-of-33 for 243 yards with three touchdowns, but two interceptions and a fumble lost. It was by no means a perfect game, but there were plenty of flashes to get people excited - highlighted by the 40-yard touchdown pass to Kayshon Boutte to close the first half. However the Patriots' defense couldn't rise to the occasion, and the Patriots lost 41-21.

One more Bills game to close us out. After an up-and-down start to the year it seemed like the Patriots were starting to turn the corner with a Week 4 win over the Carolina Panthers. That set up a trip to Buffalo on Sunday Night Football.

This game was the Patriots' chance to burst onto the national scene, and they took it. Drake Maye was spectacular, Stefon Diggs shined in his return, and the defense forced three turnovers while containing Josh Allen and James Cook. That all set up Andy Borregales for a walk-off 52-yard field goal, signaling the arrival of the Mike Vrabel Patriots as a serious player in the AFC. The Patriots haven't lost since - and now look to close this full circle this Sunday.

There are two games that were known to be important going in, but weren't true 'big games' that I wasn't sure whether or not to put on the list - the season finales in 2023 and 2024. The Patriots were well out of things by then so they didn't have traditional 'big game' stakes, but both games did hold major NFL Draft implications.

In 2023 the Patriots hosted the New York Jets, and lost 17-3 on a snowy day in Foxborough. That game snapped a 15-game head-to-head winning streak by the Patriots, but the loss allowed New England to remain in the top three in the upcoming NFL Draft, where they would select Drake Maye a few months later. Later, more historical context was added to this game, as it was the final one for Bill Belichick in New England.

A year after that the Patriots hosted the Bills in the season finale, this time with the No. 1 overall pick on the line with a loss. Both teams pulled their starters just one series into the game, opening the door for Joe Milton to outduel Mitchell Trubisky in a 23-16 Patriots win that knocked New England from the first to fourth pick in the draft order. Just like the previous year it was also the final game for the team's head coach, as Jerod Mayo's firing was announced just about an hour after the final whistle.