We just finished a very successful October, winning our 3rd game of the month at Carolina.  We got off to a slow start and everyone assumes it was because we were looking ahead to New England.  I don't think that was the case, but for whatever reason we were a little bit off the first quarter.  We missed some passes we usually hit and we fumbled a couple after the catch.  Carolina had a good offensive plan for us and they had a couple of good drives to open the game.  But our plan was to make them be patient and not give Steve Smith a deep ball and we thought we would be OK.

 

The defense really executed that plan and we made some third down stops to get the ball back for our offense.  Antoine Bethea made the play of the game for us, intercepting a ball in the end zone when we were down 7-3.  A Carolina score at that point would have gotten their crowd into the game, but we changed the momentum and got our offense going from there.  Joseph Addai and Reggie Wayne had big games for our offense and Gary Brackett and the LB's were very active on defense.

 

It was a milestone day where Peyton Manning paseed John Unitas on the Colts all time list for TD passes and I passed Ted Marchibroda and Don Shula for wins as a Colts coach.  It was very special for me, and to do it on a day when Peyton made history also was even more gratifying.  When you start out, you don't expect to break those kinds of records.  You hope to do it but you really don't expect to.  Hopefully, we'll have a few more of those moments to celebrate.

 

Now it's on to New England and a game that the whole country is talking about.  They are playing very well, winning by almost 4 TD's a game.  What you have to do in this situation is not get overwhelmed by the stats, as impressive as they are.  You can't have your team think they have to play a perfect game or that you need to come up with something different to win.  I think both teams will play their game and whoever is able to pressure the quarterback on defense and avoid turnovers on offense will win it.  But our task the next couple of days is just to focus on improving and not get caught up in the build up for the game.  It should be a fun week.