4 takeaways from the Patriots’ Super Bowl loss to the Seahawks

The New England Patriots' magical 2025 season did not get a storybook ending. After flipping from 4-13 to 14-3 and winning three games to return to the Super Bowl stage, the Pats came up short in capping the season with a title falling 29-13 to the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday night in Santa Clara.

From the start of the game, the Patriots didn't look right offensively. They had two first downs on their first drive, then picked up only one more for the rest of the first half and only one more before the Seahawks went up three scores early in the fourth quarter.

Defensively the Patriots allowed enough explosive plays early to let Seattle get an early lead with field goals. While they clamped down in the red zone more often than not, it was simply too much to allow with the offense playing the way it was.

Obviously takeaways at this point are more about looking ahead to the offseason. We'll have plenty of time to do that in the coming weeks and months. But before we turn the page, let's take a look at what went wrong for the Patriots in Super Bowl LX.

Throughout the season the Patriots dealt with a range of offensive issues that came and went. Not super uncommon for a young team, working through problems as they came up. In Super Bowl LX though, all of those problems seemed to resurface at once.

The result? A slog of an offensive performance until the game got out of hand. Some fourth-quarter success once the Seahawks went into prevent mode helped the overall numbers, but their first eight drives ended in punts (with five three-and-outs), followed by a fumble. After their first drive they didn't cross the 50-yard line again until the fourth quarter.

It started at the quarterback position. Better weather didn't help Drake Maye much. He looked sped up and uncomfortable in the pocket and was inaccurate even when given time and space. Later turnovers became a problem, with two bad interceptions and a strip sack fumble.

Still, he wasn't helped by the fact that the offensive line offered him little to no protection at times. Maye was pressured on 52.8% of his dropbacks according to Next Gen Stats, the second-highest rate this season. The Patriots seemed caught off-guard by Seattle's blitzes, but even struggled to hold up when the Seahawks sent just four rushers.

It wasn't just the all-rookie left side of the offensive line that struggled (they did), but the unit as a whole. Will Campbell had a rough night allowing a career-high 14 pressures (and had a bad third down false start penalty) according to initial charting by Next Gen Stats but all five linemen had multiple clean losses that led to free rushers. Morgan Moses and Mike Onwenu were both tagged with multiple pressures as well, with the pressure coming as bad from the right side as it did from the left.

Even in the run game, the Patriots couldn't manufacture much. More often than not the defense was making contact with the ball-carrier in the backfield. Outside of Maye's scrambles and an end-around to TreVeyon Henderson, the Patriots didn't have a run for longer than seven yards.

This all compounded - between the issues with pressure, Maye being sped up, and an inability to stay on schedule forcing them into predictable situations the Seahawks' defense was able to tee off. For the first three quarters the Patriots averaged 7.4 yards to go on third down, which just isn't sustainable against a defense with that much talent. Case in point, they went 2-for-11 on those third downs.

The defense certainly played well enough for the Patriots to win the game, with Seattle getting 17 points off turnovers (10 off short fields, plus the pick six). Yet with the offense struggling they realistically needed to do more than their fair share for the Patriots to have had a chance.

Early in the game they allowed a couple of explosive plays, but were able to settle down in the red zone. Seattle ended up scoring seven points on just one of four red zone trips, and that one came off of a turnover.

As the game went though Seattle clearly started wearing on the Patriots' defense. A 58-40 play disparity through three quarters started to show, especially when it came to slowing down running back Kenneth Walker. Walker finished the game with 135 yards on 27 carries, becoming the first running back to win Super Bowl MVP in almost 30 years.

Given the way the game went, the Patriots would have needed more negative plays made by the defense in order to have a chance to stay in it - something head coach Mike Vrabel noted after the game specifically in terms of turnovers. Sam Darnold had a few risky plays early on and the Patriots failed to take advantage, and as the game went on Seattle was able to play more conservative and didn't have to ask Darnold to do too much and risk giving the ball away.

Multiple times Darnold stepped out of and away from pressure, erasing would-be sacks. Overall the tackling was poor, a flashback to the first few games of the season before the Patriots became one of the best tackling teams in the league.

For the early majority of this game while it was a field position battle, Seattle had the special teams edge as well. Punter Michael Dickson was excellent, knocking seven punts for a 47.3 net yards per punt average with three downed inside the 20 and three downed inside the Patriots' six-yard line. The one time Marcus Jones realistically had a shot at a return, it was wiped out by a Dell Pettus block in the back.

In the kicking game Jason Myers proved to be consistent and allowed the Seahawks to play a more conservative style. He hit all five of his field goals, setting a new Super Bowl record.

On kick returns, the Patriots failed to net any extra field position. D'Ernest Johnson's longest return was 28 yards, and he couldn't consistently get to the 30 yard line. TreVeyon Henderson had a big return late in the game, begging the question of why the team didn't turn to him in that role sooner.

For those that want to look for bright spots in this game for the Patriots, there were two. Cornerback Christian Gonzalez and rookie safety Craig Woodson both played at a high level.

Gonzalez's performance in particular was notable, given he's going into the first offseason where he's eligible to sign a contract extension. Working against both Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Cooper Kupp, Gonzalez had multiple highlight pass breakups and was the biggest reason the game didn't get well out of hand way before it did and/or the score didn't end up looking uglier. It was a shutdown corner kind of performance allowing just three catches for 36 yards on seven targets, as he looks for shutdown cornerback money this spring.

As for Woodson, he was the team's leading tackler with 10, and had three tackles for a loss and two pass breakups. He was all over the field. It was individually an encouraging end to an impressive rookie season, and one he'll look to build on next year.

Obviously those performances alone weren't enough to overcome what was a down night for pretty much the entire roster. In the 'credit where credit is due' department though, Gonzalez and Woodson put together tape worthy of individual recognition.