Proven Pats hold all the aces

Falcons facing tough task in Super Bowl LI

The brotherhood did its job methodically, pleasing Atlanta owner Arthur Blank so much that he was last seen dancing into the night on the victory podium after the Falcons thrashed the Green Bay Packers to win the NFC championship on Sunday.

Blank could be excused for his exuberance. The Falcons have only been this far once before, long before their second-year coach, Dan Quinn, won his players over with a message of unity, love and toughness that landed them in the Super Bowl.

Left: New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady fist-pumps after reaching his seventh Super Bowl by beating the Pittsburgh Steelers in Sunday's AFC championship game at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts. Right: Atlanta Falcons QB Matt Ryan, who will try to deny Brady a fifth Super Bowl title, is steely-faced after leading his team past the Green Bay Packers to capture the NFC championship at the Georgia Dome on Sunday. Getty Images / AFP

Hard not to get a little giddy about it all.

"I say rise up, rise up brotherhood, rise up sisterhood. One more game to go," Blank said. "See you in Houston."

The problem for Blank and the Falcons is that they will face the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LI on Feb 5 in Houston.

The Patriots became AFC champions for the seventh time in 16 years on Sunday, because it really wouldn't seem like a Super Bowl without them.

Their coach, Bell Belichick, might go down as the greatest ever. Same with quarterback Tom Brady, who has four championship rings and knows a little bit about being methodical himself.

Oh, and you might have heard about their vendetta. They don't like to talk about it, but it's got something to do with deflated footballs, suspensions and a commissioner who wouldn't let them defend themselves.

"We'll see if we can write the perfect ending in a couple of weeks," Brady said.

This isn't the Super Bowl the NFL wanted, not by any stretch of the imagination.

The Falcons aren't a marquee team, and there's a sense that most fans outside of New England are by now more than a little weary of the Brady and Belichick act.

Worse yet, the biggest storyline of Super Bowl week will be how NFL commissioner Roger Goodell stuck it to the Patriots in Deflategate.

"For a number of reasons all of you in this stadium understand how big this win was," Pats owner Robert Kraft told the crowd after Sunday's win, doing everything but giving them a knowing wink.

But this is the Super Bowl the NFL has, and the league now must hope it gives us a game far more interesting than Sunday's conference title games. Both were decided early, and both were lopsided wins that probably had a lot of people turning off their televisions.

The brotherhood that is the Falcons scored early and often in dominating a Packers team that had won eight in a row.

The machine that is the Patriots kept humming along in picking apart the Pittsburgh Steelers to put Brady and Belichick in a record seventh showpiece.

"This team showed a lot of mental toughness over the year," said Brady, who showed some himself by coming off a four-game suspension to have a spectacular season. "It would be great to finish it off."

It's easy to see the Patriots doing just that, the way Brady is throwing and his receivers are finding ways to get wide open.

The Steelers were roused in the middle of the night when someone pulled the fire alarm in their hotel, and it looked like they were sleepwalking against precise New England passing.

The reality is that nobody knows how to prepare for a game like the dour Belichick, who seemed to be grimacing for some reason when handed the AFC trophy.

And nobody knows more about stepping up in big games than Brady, who would become the only quarterback to win five Super Bowls if he can keep it going.

They know the Super Bowl routine better than anyone, having won four of the six they've been in. For the Falcons, whose only appearance was a losing effort in 1999, it will be a trip into largely uncharted waters.

Las Vegas bookies think it will be a close affair, with lots of scoring.

The Patriots are 3-point favorites and the over/under is a record 59 points at some sports books.

Goodell will be there, because this is the Super Bowl and he doesn't have much choice. Still, it was more than interesting to Patriots fans at Gillette Stadium that Goodell attended games in Atlanta the last two weekends instead of joining them in Foxborough.

With the Patriots in command in the second half, they began a "Where is Roger?" chant that surely was heard at league offices.

Brady said he didn't hear them, and maybe that's true. He's heading to his seventh Super Bowl, so he's entitled to the benefit of doubt.

The brotherhood awaits, but it's nothing he hasn't seen before.