It might always be sunny in Philadelphia, but New England Patriots fans cannot say the same when they watch their team play in Miami. Almost every road matchup against the Miami Dolphins turns into an agonizing and bitter defeat. There have been a few exceptions here and there, yet of all of the division rivals in the AFC East, this is the one that consistently manages to steal at least one game per year. Some will say that it is the heat that slows down New England, but others believe that there is a more supernatural force that determines the outcomes of these games.
The Patriots might have been a dynasty from 2001 to 2019, but even when they hoisted the Lombardi Trophy, they lost to Miami in four of those six Super Bowl winning seasons. Normally, this would be the time to preview what to expect between these two teams in 2024, but this matchup presents a special occasion. Let’s take a trip down memory lane and revisit some of the most impactful victories for the Dolphins against the Patriots to understand why the curse is so powerful and strong.
The Dolphins Most Impactful Wins against New England
1. The Time the Patriots Choked an Eleven Point Lead
The day was December 20, 2004. The Patriots and Dolphins met in the old Pro Player Stadium on Monday Night Football, but both teams were not even close to being on the same tier as one another. New England entered this game 12-1, the best record in the National Football League, and they were hoping to be the first team to win back-to-back Super Bowl championships since the Denver Broncos from 1997 to 1998. Miami, on the other hand, was having a disastrous season. They entered this game 2-11 with one of the worst records in the AFC. They also fired their head coach Dave Wannstedt after a 1-8 start to the year and finished with the fifth-worst-scoring offense in all of football. However, one thing that slid under the radar was that their defense gave up the second-fewest passing yards. Entering this game, they gave up more than twenty-four points just twice, so the Patriots should not have taken this team lightly, even as a ten-point favorite.
For fifty-seven minutes, it looked like a standard New England victory as they led 28-17 with four minutes remaining in the game. Patriots quarterback Tom Brady had a couple of interceptions but also threw three touchdown passes, Corey Dillon put up over 120 yards on the ground, and the defense sacked starting quarterback AJ Feeley four times. However, all of a sudden, the Miami Dolphins began to recapture the momentum. In just less than two minutes, the offense went right down the field in eight plays to score a touchdown that cut their deficit to five. The Dolphins failed to get the two-point conversion, but they made it a game before the two-minute warning, Brady still had the football. All they needed to do was pick up a couple of first downs and force Miami to burn all their timeouts for the clock to run out, and the game would be theirs. But on third and nine with 1:52 remaining, the future GOAT quarterback inexplicably threw his third interception of the night, this one landing right in the hands of Brendon Ayandabajeo deep into New England territory!
More than a few plays later, the miracle happened as AJ Feeley threw the go-ahead touchdown to a leaping Derrius Thompson, and the Patriots were somehow trailing. Brady still had more than a minute left on the clock along with two timeouts to get into field goal range, but Miami’s defense shut him down on the final drive. David Bowens came up with a huge sack, and then on the next play, Brady threw his fourth interception of the night to lose the game.
New England went on to win their third Super Bowl in four years, but many who watched the 2004 Patriots will point to this game as the one that fueled them throughout the rest of the season. The rest of the world rejoiced after watching the Dolphins steal a win from the Goliath of the National Football League, but that team finished that season 4-12, so the celebrating did not last very long. But do not worry, this story only gets more painful.
2. Joey Harrington and Nick Saban Win a Shutout
Joey Harrington will be regarded as one of the biggest draft busts at the quarterback position in NFL History. The former third overall pick out of Oregon played on four teams in seven seasons, with twenty-six career victories and fifty-five losses. However, one of those wins just happened to take place against the Patriots on December 10, 2006. This was when Nick Saban was the head coach of the Miami Dolphins, just one year before he left for the University of Alabama. Heading into this matchup, the storylines were more of the same. The Patriots had one of the best records in the NFL at 9-3, while the Dolphins were a measly 5-7 football team. But once again, Miami might have had an atrocious offense, but their defense was incredibly underestimated. They allowed the fifth-fewest points in football and defensive end Jason Taylor won his first carer Defensive Player of the Year award after he led the league in forced fumbles and finished fourth in sacks with thirteen and a half. No wonder why New England was only favored by three to win because while they were technically the better team, this was not supposed to be a cakewalk.
Not only did the Dolphins win, but they did not allow the Patriots to score a single point. Field goal kicker Olindo Mare scored the only six points in the first half, but when both teams returned to the field for the third quarter, things started to fall off the rails. Tom Brady got sacked four times and was responsible for two of four New England fumbles, completing just twelve of twenty-five passes for seventy-five yards. Harrington only had 190 passing yards, 123 of them to Marty Booker, but he at least threw a touchdown pass and did not turn the ball over. He also heavily relied on running back Sammy Morris for over 120 rushing yards and a score on twenty-five carries, and the more the Patriots offense shut down, the more momentum Miami had.
The Dolphins won in a 21-0 shutout, and while it might not have been as heartbreaking as the defeat in 2004, this was still a stunning one-sided matchup. The Patriots finished the 2006 season 12-4, coming up just short of the eventual Super Bowl champion Indianapolis Colts in the AFC Championship game. Unfortunately, this game was the last victory for Miami as they lost their final three games to finish the season 6-10. In 2007, the Dolphins finished with a league-worst 1-15 record, the same year that New England went 16-0 in the regular season
3. Jay Cutler, Kenyan Drake, and Xavien Howard Shine Bright
Would you believe that the Dolphins won yet another home game on Monday Night Football against the Patriots in December? This time it was on the eleventh in 2017. Once again, New England was considered to be the vastly superior team, while Miami was thought of as an inferior division rival. Two weeks prior to this matchup, these squads met each other in Gillette Stadium and the Patriots got a resounding 35-17 victory, and had just beaten the Buffalo Bills one game later to improve to 10-2. Miami, on the other hand, had a mediocre 5-7 record with an okay roster. Jay Cutler came out of retirement to fill in for an injured Ryan Tannehill, Jarvis Landry was still one of the top receivers in the game, and their defense had plenty of Pro Bowl veterans like Ndamukong Suh and Olivier Vernon on their roster. However, the Patriots were once again favored to win this game by 10.5 points, even without Rob Gronkowski in the lineup due to a suspension. The reason why was because he made a late hit on cornerback Tre’Davious White after the rookie cornerback at the time caught an interception down the sideline.
Unsurprisingly, the Miami curse continued to plague New England as neither side of the ball was able to get a consistent feel for the game. Defensively, it was an outright disaster. Running back Kenyan Drake shined with 193 total yards from scrimmage on thirty touches, including 114 on the ground. He spun past defenders, he showed tremendous speed, and it allowed Jay Cutler to have one of the best performances of his career. He threw for well over 260 yards and three touchdown passes, putting Miami up 27-10 at one point in the fourth quarter. The offense led by Tom Brady was not that much better, and in fact, they showed that they desperately needed Gronkowski more than they thought. Not only did the eventual MVP that season throw two interceptions, but they both landed right in the arms of second-year cornerback Xavien Howard. Brady barely threw for over 230 yards and the Patriots only ran the ball for 25, so New England was one-dimensional from the start.
The fact that the Dolphins only won by seven points was very telling because this should have easily been a blowout, but once again, each of these teams headed in totally different directions after this game. The Patriots finished with the best record in the AFC at 13-3 and advanced to its eighth Super Bowl in sixteen years, unfortunately falling short to the Philadelphia Eagles 41-33. The Dolphins lost their final three games of the year to go 6-10 once again and miss the playoffs. This was yet another game in which New England used this defeat as fuel for the postseason, whereas Miami got too caught up in the excitement and fell apart.
4. Tua Eliminates New England From the Playoffs
The United States of America was in a troubling period of time in 2020. However, the football season continued as scheduled, even if there was a COVID-19 pandemic that continued to affect the lives of millions of citizens. Once again, the matchup was set in December, but things were different this time around. After Tom Brady left the Patriots in the offseason, the team stumbled into a mediocre state, whereas the Dolphins were the ones trying to turn their fortunes around. New England entered this game 6-7 and were one defeat away from being eliminated from playoff contention, while Miami was 8-5 and needed to win the rest of their games for them to clinch at least a Wild Card spot. It is very ironic that both teams were on completely opposite ends of the spectrum than they were in the past, but the NFL populace was sick and tired of watching the Patriots march their way into the postseason, so the Miami Dolphins were in a perfect position to do something that had not been done since 2008.
The Patriots were weirdly favored by one and a half points because their defense was still consistently strong under Bill Belichick, but an offense that was at the bottom in both passing yards and passing touchdowns. The Dolphins, coached by former Patriots defensive coordinator Brian Flores, had the sixth-best scoring defense in football and won seven of their nine previous games. If there was anybody that should have been favored, it was this team because they deserved to have a promising season, even with a rookie quarterback in Tua Tagovailoa.
In the first half, both defenses played their tails off. Nick Folk scored the only six points for New England, but Tua Tagovailoa got off to a rocky start with two sacks taken and an interception. He finished the game with just 145 yards on twenty completions, but when the third quarter began, the Dolphins offense took an entirely different approach. They simply went with a run-heavy attack and the Patriots had no answers in terms of how to slow it down. Rookie running back Salvon Ahmed became a star that day with 122 rushing yards and a touchdown on twenty-three carries, while Matt Breida picked up eighty-six yards on just twelve touches. Up by three points with close to three minutes left in the game, Tua snuck into the end zone for the Dolphins to pull ahead by ten and to cap off a 200+-yard rushing performance against a Bill Belichick-coached defense. The Patriots offense was led by quarterback Cam Newton, who not only showed signs of physical decline but proved that he could no longer see the field the way he used to when he was in his prime. New England failed to score a touchdown all afternoon, relying on four field goals from Folk to score all twelve of their points, and they clearly did not play well enough to win that football game.
The Patriots were eliminated from playoff contention with a 22-12 defeat and finished that 2020 season 7-9, but unfortunately, Miami was not invited either. Entering the regular season finale with a 10-5 record, all they needed to do was beat the Buffalo Bills on the road, but they got crushed 56-26. The reason why this game was the fourth one mentioned was because this was one of the only seasons where both teams ended up in the same boat. This time, the Dolphins were not forced to watch the Patriots win another championship on their television screens. Instead, they both got to watch Tom Brady win a seventh Super Bowl. Now they both get to know what pain truly feels like for once!
5. The Miami Miracle
Obviously, the best one has to be saved for last. The loss to Tua in 2020 might have been the true end of an era for New England, but this loss two years earlier was a confirmation that this curse was never going to go away unless the Dolphins were a completely horrible football team. The date was December 9, 2018. That’s right, they met up in December again, what a shocker. The Patriots were once again favored by nine and a half points at 9-3 to beat a Miami team that was still in playoff contention at 6-6, so this matchup was one of the only rare occasions where both teams needed a win to keep those hopes alive. The only difference was that New England had to clinch their division while the Dolphins could not afford to lose another game. What ensued in Hard Rock Stadium was an insanely electric offensive showcase between both teams, especially in the first half.
Both the Patriots and Dolphins went back and forth scoring touchdowns against one another. Tom Brady was responsible for three of those scores to three different receivers: Cordarrelle Patterson, Julian Edelman, and Rob Gronkowski. The Dolphins relied on splash plays to get their points on the board, which included two scores from former Patriot Brandon Bolden, one of them from 54 yards away early in the second quarter. At halftime, New England was up 27-21. They could have easily been ahead by more if Brady did not get sacked by Robert Quinn with under twelve seconds in the first half when they had no timeouts left. New England stalled out for most of the second half as their offense failed to reach the endzone, but after two missed field goals earlier in the afternoon, kicker Stephen Gostkowski did at least enough to give the Patriots a five-point lead with seven seconds left. All the Patriots defense had to do was not give up a touchdown and the AFC East would be theirs for the taking. The Dolphins had the ball at their own thirty-one-yard line, but Bill Belichick weirdly decided to have Rob Gronkowski cover the deep part of the field, thinking that Miami was going to launch a Hail Mary. Spoiler alert, it was not.
Ryan Tannehill threw a medium pass to Kenny Stills for fourteen yards, who lateraled it to DeVante Parker, who pitched it to running back Kenyan Drake. Remember the guy who torched New England’s defense last year on Monday Night Football? Well, one season later, he just happened to make the biggest play of his half. When he got his hands on the football, he skirted his way past three defenders all the way down the sideline and made Gronkowski slip on the final tackle to score the game-winning touchdown! If that does not tell anybody that playing in Miami is a jinx for New England, then what will? However, it was not like this defeat ended their season. The Patriots finished 11-5 as the second-best team in the AFC and went on to win their sixth Super Bowl in franchise history, while the Dolphins once again dropped their final three games to finish the season 7-9. Not too long after Week 17, their head coach Adam Gase was fired and their starting quarterback Ryan Tannehill was traded to the Tennessee Titans, signaling the beginning of a complete rebuild.
Hopefully, everybody understands why the Miami curse for the New England Patriots is too strong and powerful for them to overcome. Although the Patriots stole incredible riches in their twenty-year dynastic period, these losses to Miami were agonizing, frustrating, heartbreaking, and mind-boggling. These victories for the Dolphins are sadly enough their versions of the Super Bowl because when they know they have to give everything they have to win this game, they look like a formidable and respectable team.
On November 24, 2024, these two teams will meet up with one another in Hard Rock Stadium at 1:00 ET. New England has a dismal 3-8 record with not too many bright spots on their roster. The one positive is that they have a promising rookie quarterback in Drake Maye, but the supporting cast around him is putrid. Their offensive line is horrible in both run blocking and pass protection, they do not have a game-changing wide receiver, and their running game is alarmingly inconsistent. The defense has dealt with an abundance of injuries and is ranked near the bottom in a vast array of categories, especially now that the team is in its first year without Bill Belichick as the head coach.
The Miami Dolphins are not that much better at 4-6, but in their defense, they did not have their starting quarterback for four weeks due to a concussion. Tua made his return in late October, and now the team is coming off two straight victories in an effort to run the table and fight their way back into the playoff picture. He has also yet to lose a game against the Patriots, even with Belichick as the head coach, so that is another huge advantage for Miami. However, the Dolphins are also The ones under the most pressure because their season is on the line, but it could serve as a perfect opportunity for New England to pull off a stunning upset since they have nothing to lose besides a high draft pick. However, the Miami curse is not one to take lightly, so getting a win in this city requires complete perfection across the board.
Main Image: Jasen Vinlove-Imagn Images
