'Patriots Mystique' stands in way of Colts

But Indianapolis has home-field edge in the battle for the Super Bowl.
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- Tony Dungy calls it "the Patriots Mystique" and acknowledges it's something he and the Indianapolis Colts have to overcome to get to their first Super Bowl.
That has to be something Bill Belichick loves. One reason New England has won three NFL titles in the past five seasons is because it gets into the heads of opponents -- none more so than Peyton Manning and the Colts.
Thus the theme for tonight's AFC championship game at the RCA Dome -- the Patriots, a bit undermanned compared to previous years, against the talented but frustrated Colts, who twice have been knocked out of the playoffs by Belichick's team en route to the Super Bowl.
"You have to play them and not their mystique, and that's hard to do," says Dungy, the Colts coach who has reached this point twice before without making it to the NFL's marquee game despite a regular season record of 114-62, a winning percentage of .648.
Feeling the heat
Most of the pressure seems to be on Manning, who holds myriad passing records, including 49 touchdown passes in the 2004 season, but never has gotten to the Super Bowl and is 5-6 in playoff games.
That's in stark contrast to Tom Brady of the Patriots, who has less gaudy passing stats but is 12-1 in the postseason. He owns three Super Bowl rings and two Super Bowl MVP awards for twice driving New England to the winning score on the final drive.
Each time, the winning field goal was kicked by Adam Vinatieri, now a Colt.
The party line on Manning was best expressed this week by Colts center Jeff Saturday -- largely because the Colts quarterback was kept away from the media by the team for most of the week.
"Peyton is a great quarterback in regular season and postseason," Saturday said. "When he plays well, he gets a great amount of credit. When he doesn't play well, he gets slaughtered. That shouldn't be. It's our team that wins or loses."
Underdogs advance
Neither Manning nor Brady has played especially well this postseason, in which their teams entered the playoffs as the third- and fourth-seeded teams in the AFC with regular season records of 12-4.
Manning has thrown five interceptions and has just one touchdown pass in wins over Kansas City and Baltimore and his passer rating is 58.9, a figure that gets quarterbacks benched under normal circumstances.
But the Colts' defense, which allowed 173 yards rushing per game in the regular season, by far the worst in the NFL, has allowed just one touchdown and 127 yards rushing in the two games combined. The return to health of strong safety Bob Sanders and the development of defensive tackle Anthony McFarland, acquired in October, are cited as reasons.
The Patriots also have won with defense although, as usual, they have an unexpected standout -- wide receiver Jabar Gaffney, who has 18 receptions in the playoffs after having 11 in the regular season after being picked up off the street in October.
Gaffney had 10 catches against San Diego last week, but Brady also threw three interceptions in the 27-24 win over the Chargers. Still, one of them was fumbled back on the same play by the Chargers and led to the Patriots' tying fourth quarter touchdown.
Talk about "Patriots Mystique."
Change of venue
Still, that's in the past, as are the two playoff games won by New England over Indianapolis -- a 24-14 victory in the 2004 AFC title game and 20-3 two years ago in a second-round game.
Both those games were in Foxborough, as were wins by the Colts over the Patriots the last two seasons: 40-21 in 2005 and 27-20 this season, the latter giving Indy the tie-breaker for home field for this game.
In fact, these teams have met seven times in the past four seasons and were division rivals who met twice a year before the league was realigned for the 2002 season.
"We know we've had a great history with this team, but to me I don't really think any of that makes any difference," Belichick said.
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