By now everybody knows that New England officially wrapped up another AFC East division title on Sunday. Many news and media outlets have mentioned that the Patriots have had 12 consecutive winning seasons. But what no one seems to be discussing is the fact that the Pats have also had the most wins in the division every single year during that span. That’s right, since the day Tom Brady first took over as the starting quarterback in 2001, no team in the AFC East has ever ended the regular season with more wins than New England.
The Patriots have 10 division championships during that 12 year stretch, and the other two seasons they finished tied atop the standings but lost due to tiebreakers. In 2002-’03 there was a three-way tie of 9-7 teams along with Miami and the Jets (oddly Buffalo went 8-8 that year). Then in 2008-’09 when Brady was hurt the Matt Cassel led Pats went 11-5 (the only team in NFL history to go 11-5 and not get in the playoffs), but lost a tiebreaker to the Dolphins.
The Patriots have also averaged slightly better than a 12-4 record over that twelve year span. They are currently 143-45 since the begging of the 2001 season; winning 76% of the time they take the field. I wrote a piece detailing all of this a little over a year ago, and since then the numbers have only gotten better.
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