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Trey Flowers finished with a sack and four quarterback hits on Sunday.
By Mark Daniels
November 25, 2018
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. – The Patriots knew they needed to better their pass rush in order to play a better blend of football.
Mission accomplished.
On Sunday, the Patriots received a major push from their top two pass rushers – Trey Flowers and Deatrich Wise – as they hit Jets quarterback Josh McCown 13 times and sacked him twice. Flowers led the way with four quarterback hits and a sack. Wise finished with three quarterback hits and a sack.
″[We] just put pressure on them – stopping the run, making them one dimensional,” Flowers said. “Put them in situations where we could pin our ears back and get some great rush on them. I think that was one of the things, stopping them on early downs, putting them behind the sticks and we were able to continue to get some production in the rush.”
“We did a great job in coverage allowing the quarterback to hold the ball longer, allowing us to get there faster,” Wise added. “We pretty much married the rush and coverage together.”
Flowers has been outstanding this season, but the stat sheet hasn’t been revealing. He finished with a team-high 6.5 sacks last season, and seven sacks in 2016, but came into Sunday’s game with just 2.5 sacks on the season. Of course, sack numbers don’t tell the whole story, but players love when they’re able to directly contribute. Flowers was able to get his sack at 4:29 of the fourth.
Wise had five sacks last season as a rookie. He now leads the Patriots with 4.5 sacks. He notched the team’s first sack on Sunday at 14:16 of the fourth.
“You’ve got to give credit to all 11 guys out there doing their jobs,” Flowers said. “I think that helped me get production and help my team win.”
“I’m out there playing for my brothers just trying to build the trust in them so they can believe in me out there,” added Wise. “It’s awesome playing alongside Trey. We grew up playing against each other. Now, playing with each other in the league, we just got to keep on balling.”
