NFL

Playoff matchup a first for Pats, Chiefs

Rich Garven @RichGarvenTG

Despite both franchises being founded in 1960 as inaugural members of the American Football League, the Patriots and Kansas City Chiefs amazingly have never met in the playoffs.

That will change beginning at 4:35 p.m. on Saturday when the two meet in an AFC divisional-round game at Gillette Stadium. It’s a matchup of teams that trended in opposite directions over the course of the season.

The Patriots fired out to a 10-0 start before stumbling after Thanksgiving, going 2-4 and losing their final two games.

The Patriots were the only one of the 12 teams to make the playoffs to have a losing record in the final six regular-season games and the only one to enter the postseason riding a two-game losing streak. It was their worst six-game finish and the only time they’ve lost their final two games in Bill Belichick’s 16 seasons as coach in New England.

“We’re focused on the future,” receiver Danny Amendola said. “We’d like to change some things that happened in the past; wouldn’t we all. So we’re just focused on what we can do to put ourselves in the best position that we need to be in a week.”

Still, the Patriots’ record of 12-4 was good enough to secure the second seed in the AFC, a first-round bye and the ensuing home playoff game that comes with it.

Meanwhile, the Chiefs started 1-5 before closing with a league-best 10 straight wins to finish second in the AFC West, earn the fifth seed in the conference and make the playoffs for the second time in the last three seasons.

While Belichick repeatedly stressed last week that how the Patriots finished the season will be of no relevance on Saturday — the team that plays the best that day will win, and all that — he says there is merit to the fact that the Chiefs have played so well for so long.

It compounds the difficulty of finding a way to become the first team to beat them since Oct. 18.

“Well, the fact that they haven’t lost in so long — it’s not like you can go to a game and say, ‘OK, well, here’s how this team defeated them,’” Belichick said on Sunday in a conference call. “I mean, that doesn’t exist. So we’ve got to figure out a way, and there’s not a great [recent] example on film.

“There are different things we can point to, probably ideas or concepts or a certain part of the game that went well for one of Kansas City’s opponents, but overall nothing really that you can say, ‘Well, this team found a way to do it, because they didn’t.’ That certainly was the case [on Saturday].”

The good times continued as the Chiefs extended their franchise-record winning streak to 11 games with a 30-0 beatdown of the Texans on Saturday in Houston. The decisive decision delivered the franchise its first postseason victory since 1994, ending a string of eight successive setbacks.

“They pretty much dominated that game from the opening kickoff all the way through the fourth quarter,” Belichick said. “Kansas City is a good football team. They’re well coached. I think [Saturday’s] game was kind of a typical Kansas City game over the last three-quarters of the season. Lot of turnovers on defense, no turnovers on offense and capitalize on opponent’s mistakes and didn’t make many. They’ve won a lot of games pretty much doing that.”

The Chiefs booted the Texans by getting contributions from all three phases, following a football formula that has served them well during their white-hot winning ways.

Quarterback Alex Smith was efficient, completing 17 of 22 passes for 199 yards and a touchdown while adding 27 yards on five carries. He did throw an interception, committing the Chiefs’ only turnover.

It was the first postseason pick of Smith’s career and ended his league record of playoff passes without an interception to start a career at 119. Smith’s 77.3-percent completion percentage eclipsed a franchise record for a playoff game that had stood since 1970.

The Chiefs also produced five turnovers and opened the game with a 106-yard kick return for a touchdown by Knile Davis while on their way to posting the first shutout in an NFL playoff game in 10 years.