For a few minutes in the second quarter, it looked like the New England Patriots might have a chance to give the Kansas City Chiefs a really tough test in Sunday's Week 15 game at Gillette Stadium.
Patriots starting quarterback Bailey Zappe completed his second touchdown pass to Hunter Henry with 5:34 remaining in the first half. It looked like New England had just taken a 14-7 lead. But a holding penalty on left tackle Conor McDermott negated the touchdown and the Patriots settled for a field goal and a 10-7 advantage.
The Patriots offense didn't score again until garbage time in the fourth quarter.
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For the second consecutive week, the Patriots offense moved the ball with consistency and scored double-digit points in the first half, only to see that momentum grind to a screeching halt in the second half.
Zappe completed 17 of 19 pass attempts for 141 yards with one touchdown and zero interceptions in the first half. But in the second half he completed six of 12 pass attempts for just 39 yards with zero touchdowns and an interception.
It was a costly turnover that gave the Chiefs a 1st-and-goal early in the third quarter. They scored a touchdown three plays later to go up 24-10 -- a deficit too large for the Patriots to overcome in a 27-17 loss.
How would Zappe assess his performance overall?
"Just simply not good enough," Zappe said in his postgame press conference. "Started out hot again, like we did the previous week. Came in here, made adjustments, understood how we wanted to attack, went out in the second half and threw an interception on the first play of the second half, which was terrible on my part.
"You take away that and you take away seven points, it's a whole different game. And then they got the ball and scored. That's on me. You take away that play and it's a different game. Not good enough. There are things I'm going to clean up going into next week and get ready for the Broncos."
Zappe finished 23-of-31 for 180 yards with one touchdown and one interception. He also was sacked four times.
The second-year quarterback has been an improvement over Mac Jones, who started the Patriots' first 12 games at quarterback. But a slight improvement isn't good enough for the Patriots to win games, especially against quality opponents such as the Chiefs.
Next up for the Patriots is a Week 16 matchup against the Broncos in Denver on Christmas Eve.