PATRIOTS HEAD COACH BILL BELICHICK

*(on the game)
*"Congratulations to the Giants. They made some plays there at the end and we didn't. It's disappointing."

*(on the comments made by the Rams)
*"I haven't heard them."

*(on whether he thought about going for the field goal instead of going for it on 4th and long)
*"Yeah, but it was a 50-yard field goal."

*(on whether he thought this was the toughest loss of his career)
*"I don't rank them. It's disappointing."

*(on what the Giants did well to stop your offense)
*"They did a good job defensively. They played well."

*(on the Giants pass rush)
*"They are a very good defensive football team. They played well."

*(on anything specific the Giants did to stop your offense)
*"I mean look, they played well. They made some plays. We made some plays. In the end, they made a couple more than we did."

PATRIOTS QB TOM BRADY

*(on his thoughts)
*"We had a great season; we just didn't win the game. Tonight doesn't take away from anything we have done over the course of the season. We had a great year. It is just unfortunate that tonight turned out the way it did. The Giants certainly deserve it; it's a great football team. As difficult as it is for us, you got to hand it to them. They made more plays than we did."

*(on the Giants pressure)
*"They are a great team. They are very good on defense. They have some great pressure schemes, obviously some great pass rushers. Once we kind of got the idea of what we were doing, I thought we handled it much better but we just didn't get the ball in the end zone enough. You score 14 points. I think that was our lowest total of the year and that got us beat."

*(more on his thoughts)
*"I probably need some time to reflect on the game and some time to reflect on the season. It is extremely disappointing. This isn't something any of us prepare for but you go into a game and you know that some team is going to win and some team has to lose. I thought they had a very good game plan, they executed it very well. It was a three-point win. We usually are on the better side of those three-point wins. We just have to regroup and come back and try to make it stronger next year."

*(more on the game)
*"Like I said, I think we all could have done things better. I could have made better reads and made better throws. We will try to improve that moving forward next season. Like I said, it doesn't take away from the 18 wins we had; those were all great. We enjoyed all of those. It's just probably the one we wanted most eluded us this season. We will be working extremely hard to come back next year and try to figure out the problems from this game so we can move forward."

*(on how long it will take to recover from this loss)
*"I don't know, I don't know. I am sure a long time. It has been a long season for everybody. The team has given everything they had over the course of this season. There was a lot of pressure on us all year and I think now that the season is over, everyone will get a chance to rest and let their bodies recover. You never forget these ones. I haven't forgotten the Colts game from last year. The losses you always remember as much; they are the hardest. When you are winning with two minutes and 40 seconds left, you are hoping you can pull it out."

*(more on the Giants)
*"You have to give those guys credit. Eli (Manning) took the team down the field and they got some great catches by their offense. Their receivers made some really great plays. That's what it takes to win the Super Bowl and they were on the right end of those plays."

*(on what makes the Giants defense so good)
*"I think it is their overall defensive scheme. They got good coverage guys; they have a good pass rush. They are a good team. I think they are coordinated very well. They are obviously very well-coached. They were just more than we could handle tonight."

*(on the game)
*"We wanted to win the game as bad as the Giants did. We gave everything we had; we just came up short. That is part of competition, that is part of taking the field and laying it on the line. This team worked extremely hard for six months; throughout camp. It was good enough for 18 wins; it is just the most important one we ended up losing. I am sure we are all going to wake up tomorrow more disappointed. When you review the film I am sure we all could have done things better. But it is just part of competition; we competed against a team that is very deserving of being Super Bowl champs."

*(on the Patriots offense)
*"We didn't get into a great rhythm, although we took the ball and went right down the field and scored a touchdown. The second drive we didn't pick up a second-and-one and a third-and-one. And the next drive, another three-and-out. We had a fourth drive before the half and we had a chance there at the end when there was the strip-sack. We had a good drive going there at the beginning of the third quarter and they kind of knocked us out of field goal range. We decided to go for it instead of punting, maybe on the 38 (yard line) or so. We didn't get that. Just a lot of missed opportunities. I think we were close a lot of times; just not close enough."

PATRIOTS LB TEDY BRUSCHI

*(on the disappointing loss)
*"Very disappointing, to come this far and lose the biggest game of the year is disappointing. You prepare, you have two weeks to prepare for this game and think you're going to put a good showing out there and both teams think they're going to win the game. But congratulations to the New York Giants."

*(on the difference in the game)
*"It was a football game. They had a great two minute drive at the end of the game, Eli was taking his shots, and I think it was Tyree making a great catch. Those were great plays and the plays you need to make to become World Champions and they did it."

*(on the N.Y. Giants last drive)
*"Even all the way to the 4th and short, they made by a foot or something like that. Maybe we had a couple of balls that go off our hands, you know but we had our chances. They were the ones that executed in the most critical time of the game and all I can say is congratulations to them."

PATRIOTS WR WES WELKER

*(on the loss)
*"You have to give it up to them. They played well out there. They out-executed us, and we let them do some things. They played sharp tonight."

*(on the Giants defense)
*"They've got some good pass rushers, some guys that break on the ball well, and they do some good things out there. It makes it tough to get those throws downfield. They did a great job with their pass rush. They covered it short."

*(on if this loss seems surreal)
*"Yeah, it is. We've been able to close out games like that. Unfortunately, this time, we weren't able to. Obviously, we came up short."

*(on the emotion after the Giants final touchdown)
*"It was tough. Sometimes, the ball bounces your way. That's what happened to the Giants tonight."

*(on Tom Brady)
*"Tom is the best in the game. He's everything you want in a quarterback. There's no quarterback I'd rather play with. He showed great poise on that last drive."

*(on their final possession)
*"We're just trying to move the ball downfield and get an opportunity to kick the field goal. We knew there was an opportunity there, and it's the Super Bowl. We weren't just going to give it away."

*(on if he knew he tied a Super Bowl record with 11 receptions)
*"No, I didn't."

*(on executing well on their touchdown drive in the fourth quarter)
*"We just have to execute as an offense and move it along. However it happens, it happens. We should move the ball a lot more effectively than we did. We didn't do that all game, and we should have."

*(on going the whole season without a loss)
*"I don't know if it's really set in or not. It is what it is, and there's really nothing you can do."