New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick addresses the media during his postgame press conference on Sunday, October 12, 2008.
BB: San Diego obviously did a good job tonight, a lot better than we did. They hit the deep balls on us, defensively. They did a good job of getting field position in the kicking game, and offensively. They were able to keep us out of the end zone, until the end. They played a solid game in all three phases. They just did a better job than we did. Give them credit. We need to work harder and just so a better job all the way around than we did tonight. It's as simple as that.
Q: How did you feel about the week of preparation?
BB: Good. I thought it was good.
Q: Did that opening play set the tone for the game?
BB: They're a down the field passing team. It didn't surprise us. They did a good job with it. We didn't do a good job with it. Like Norv (Turner) said that's what his offense is and that's what it is; lots of runs and deep shots, deep ball passing - that's what they did. We just didn't defend it as well as we needed to.
Q: The first series of the second half looked like you were ready to take it to the end zone. What happened?
BB: We couldn't get it in. We just didn't get it in down there. It certainly would have helped us and made it a one score game. We weren't able to make the plays and they made them. That's why they won tonight; they made more than we did and made them down there on the goal line.
Q: Did the injuries to the secondary affect your game?
BB: No. We ran what we wanted to run.
Q: Two of the last three games you lost solidly. Do you miss [Tom] Brady that much? Is it putting more pressure on the defense because you're not scoring as much as you were a year ago?
BB: Tonight, I thought that San Diego played better than we did. They did a better job than we did in all three phases of the game. That's how I would assess it.
Q: Is it different this year playing from behind?
BB: We've just got to do a better job all the way around.
Q: How would you assess Matt Cassel?
BB: I think, again, in all three phases, we weren't good enough tonight. We weren't as good as San Diego was. They out performed us in all three phases. I don't know how else to say it. Give them credit. They played well. They played better than we did. They played better and they coached better. They deserved to win.
Q: Did you give any thought at all to challenging [Malcom] Floyd's touchdown?
BB: I didn't have enough [evidence] to. Based on what I saw, we didn't have enough evidence to challenge it.
Q: Would you say you see improvement from week to week?
BB: I think we did some things well tonight, but not enough of them. We need to do more. There are still some positive things out there. The Chargers had more than we did. That's the bottom line.
Q: On Deltha O'Neil's progress:
BB: I would say the same thing about everybody. They did a better job than we did; I would say that about the players, the coaches, the whole works. The San Diego Chargers were better than the New England Patriots tonight. That's across the board.
