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"He made a good decision," Brady said. "We left ourselves with a little bit of time."
Early this season, the Patriots lost to the Buffalo Bills 34-31 in the third game when they couldn't get the ball back.
The Bills appeared to score with 1:43 left on a 39-yard pass play from Ryan Fitzpatrick to Fred Jackson. But the ruling that Jackson crossed the goal line was reversed after replay and Buffalo got the ball at the 1. Fitzpatrick kept kneeling on every play until Rian Lindell kicked a winning 28-yard field goal as time expired.
Belichick's clear-the-way order was similar to Holmgren's decision in the 1998 Super Bowl. The score was tied at 24 when he let Terrell Davis score on a 1-yard run with 1:45 left rather than allow the Broncos to run down the clock for a short field goal attempt.
Brett Favre then led the Packers from their 30 to the Broncos 31. But after three straight incompletions, Denver regained possession with 28 seconds to go and John Elway kneeled down to end the game.
More recently, the New York Jets had no timeouts and tried to let Jacksonville's Maurice Jones-Drew score on Nov. 15, 2009. But he stopped at the 1 after a 9-yard gain with about 1 1-2 minutes left.
"I was looking for someone to tackle me," he said.
David Garrard took a knee on the next two plays and Josh Scobee kicked a 21-yard field goal that gave the Jaguars a 24-22 victory.
Jones-Drew's play reminded Garrard of when Philadelphia's Brian Westbrook also took a knee at the 1 to seal a late-season win over Dallas in 2007.
But the Super Bowl decision by Belichick is likely to linger the longest as sports fans debate its wisdom over the years.
At least one person with a rooting interest, Giants running back Brandon Jacobs, knew it wouldn't work.
"I respect Tom Brady and the New England Patriots," he said. "He does a great job with the guys he has. But if that was Drew Brees or Aaron Rodgers on the other side, with those big play outfits, 57 seconds would have been plenty enough time for those guys."
The Patriots' passes, he said, are much shorter.
"They needed a helluva lot more than 57 seconds to be able to win the football game," Jacobs said. "So I wasn't worried at all."
But what choice did they have?
"It was better than not having a chance at all," Brady said.
[Associated Press;
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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