FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — The NFL forced Tom Brady to sit out the first four games of the season, punishment for his role in an alleged football-deflating scheme.
That did not stop Brady and the New England Patriots from returning to the Super Bowl.
The veteran quarterback looked as poised and polished as ever throughout the season and again on Sunday in a 36-17 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers in the AFC title game at Gillette Stadium.
Brady passed for 384 yards and three touchdowns — including one on a flea-flicker play — as the Patriots earned a record ninth Super Bowl appearance, their second in three seasons.
The Patriots will play the Atlanta Falcons, 44-21 winners Sunday over the Green Bay Packers in the NFC title game, in two weeks in Super Bowl LI at Reliant Stadium in Houston.
Brady and coach Bill Belichick are heading to the Super Bowl for the seventh time, and they are in search of their fifth championship.
Just as they did during the 2001 and 2004 seasons — when they won Super Bowl titles — the Patriots advanced by defeating the Steelers in the title game.
This time, Brady relied heavily on receiver Chris Hogan, who caught nine passes for 180 yards and two touchdowns as the Patriots extended their winning streak to nine games and improved their record to 16-2.
And they did it with the crowd at times chanting “Roger,” a reference to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who handed down Brady’s suspension and chose to attend the NFC title game rather than visit Gillette Stadium.
The Steelers had hoped to duplicate the Denver Broncos’ performance in last season’s AFC title game, when they sacked Brady four times and hit him 17 others.
But the Patriots’ offensive line gave Brady all the time he needed.
He spread the wealth, completing 32 of 42 passes to nine receivers. Julian Edelman had eight catches for 118 yards, including a 10-yard fourth-quarter touchdown.
Brady will enter the Super Bowl having thrown 33 touchdown passes, with only four interceptions.
It wasn’t all Brady and the offense on Sunday.
The Patriots defense forced two turnovers and came up with a goal-line stand that forced the Steelers to settle for a field goal near the end of the first half.
The secondary controlled Steelers star receiver Antonio Brown and broke up passes throughout the game. Eric Rowe, Malcolm Butler, Logan Ryan and Patrick Chung all made key plays.
The Patriots led, 17-9, at halftime, added a third-quarter field goal and then all but sealed the victory with a three-play sequence near the end of the third quarter.
Brady connected with Hogan for 39 yards, running back LeGarrette Blount dragged nearly the entire defense for the final 10 yards of an 18-yard gain and then scored on a one-yard run for a 27-9 lead.
The Patriots forced a fumble on the first play of the ensuing possession and Brady hit Edelman for the touchdown, starting a celebration by the crowd.
Falcons 44, Packers 21
ATLANTA — The Falcons discovered a handy truth just in time for their trip to the Super Bowl.
Unstoppable is very hard to beat.
Six touchdowns and a field goal in the first eight possessions — yeah, that qualifies.
The Falcons, a team that once made a tradition out of lowering expectations, are officially in the business of dreaming large. Beating Green Bay in an NFC championship will go far toward redefining a team’s place in the food chain.
“We ran into a buzzsaw,” Green Bay coach Mike McCarthy said. The Falcons 44-21 victory had all the makings of a workman’s comp claim for McCarthy’s guys.
This will be the Falcons second-ever trip to the Super Bowl, where they’ll meet the New England Patriots in two week. But this is the first time they will go into the game with so much wind at their back. Average margin of victory in their two postseason games: Nearly 20 points.
Sunday’s anticipated shootout between Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan and Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers gained no traction. Ryan, the presumptive MVP, and his small army of pass catchers would have none of it.
Ryan out-threw his more famous counterpart in yardage, 392-287, and touchdowns, 4-3. He even out-legged him, never mind that he is statuary compared to Rodgers. It was on the Falcons second touchdown of the day — probably, after so many you kind of lose track — that Ryan took the opportunity after Green Bay’s entire defense turned its back to him to run 14 fairly nifty yards for a score. It was the first rushing touchdown in 83 games for Ryan.
“We did have some fun with that during the game — like, ‘Man, you looked fast today,’ ” Falcons coach Dan Quinn said.
But the quarterback match-up really wasn’t fair. Ryan had Julio Jones on his side, the man who Quinn rightfully described as making “the extraordinary plays seem ordinary.”
The most extraordinary of Jones’ nine receptions, and certainly the most extraordinary 73 yards of his 180 yards total, occurred on the Falcons second play of the second half. Ryan dumped a little pass his way in the middle and watched the fun as Green Bay gave fruitless chase up the sideline. Every play his way is an invitation to do something incendiary.
This will be Ryan’s first trip to a Super Bowl in nine, sometimes difficult, years in the NFL.
He was, not surprisingly, quite buttoned down about it all afterward.
“You can’t lose belief or confidence,” he said. “One thing about this league week-to-week you can get humbled very quickly. So many good players. So many good teams. You learn what works best for you personally and what works best for your team. That has taken time, for sure.
“I always felt we would get to this point where we’d have an opportunity to play in this game, and I’m happy that we’re there.”
Given the high level of play of the Falcons offense, all that was needed from the defense was just one stand, one play. Maybe two.
The Falcons got considerably more than that Sunday. The Packers went six-and-out with their first possession, Rodgers hurried into a third-down incompletion with another rookie, Deion Jones, draped around his waist. A promising drive with their second possession was snuffed when Jalen Collins ripped the ball from the grasp of fullback Aaron Ripkowski and recovered in the end zone.
