New England Patriots Clinch AFC East

Week 12 of the 2007 NFL Season saw The New England Patriots became the earliest team to clinch their division since 1978, when the NFL went to a 16 game schedule. They went into their Sunday Night Football game already having clinched on the strength of a loss by the second place Buffalo Bills earlier in the day without having played a down of their Week 12 match up. They clinched the AFC East with a record of 10-0.

At the end of the day, the Patriots sat at 11-0, after having squeaked by the Philadelphia Eagles 31-28.

There have only been three other teams to clinch their division after 12 weeks since the schedule expanded: The 1985 Chicago Bears, the 1997 San Francisco 49ers, and the 2004 Philadelphia Eagles.

What does history tell us of these teams?

The 1985 Chicago Bears finished the season at 15-1, having lost their first and only game of the season in Week 13 to the Miami Dolphins. They averaged 28.5 points a game and gave up an average of 12.375 points a game; doubtlessly one of the best defensive teams in the modern history of the NFL.

They stormed through the NFC Playoffs, shutting out their two opponents - the New York Giants and the Los Angeles Rams while scoring a total of 45 points. The first points they allowed in the entire post season were the first 3-points of Super Bowl XX, a game in which they defeated the New England Patriots 46-10. In three post-season games, the Bears scored 91 points and allowed 10.

They clinched their division at 11-0.

The 1997 San Francisco 49ers finished the season at 13-3. After having lost the first game of the season to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 13-6, they went on a 12 game winning streak before being blown out in Week 14 to the Kansas City Chiefs 44-9; they bookended the season with a loss, this time to the Seattle Seahawks 38-9.

This team made a run at the playoffs, beating the Minnesota Vikings 38-22 in the Divisional round of the playoffs, but were stopped cold by the Green Bay Packers in the NFC Championship game 23-10 as the Packers advanced to their second consecutive Super Bowl.

They clinched their division at 10-1.

The 2004 Philadelphia Eagles finished the season at 13-3 after winning their first seven games in reasonably convincing fashion, and after losing in Week 9 in a thumping by the cross-state Pittsburgh Steelers, they came back with 4-more dominant wins before sputtering at the end of the season, going 2-2 in the last 4 games and losing the last two.

They marched soundly through the NFC playoffs, defeating both the Minnesota Vikings and the Atlanta Falcons by 13 and 10 points respectively.

They, too, advanced to the Super Bowl, only to be upended by the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XXXIX 24-21.

They clinched their division with a record of 10-1.

The truism history provides as a guide is that an early divisional clinch means only that a team has qualified for the playoffs early. A great team can win it all - see the '85 Bears - but there is a cautionary tale in that the other two teams that qualified this early failed in their playoff run. In fact, those two went on to lose 2 of their remaining 5 games.

What history suggests, though limited to those three teams, is that a team that can this much more dominant than not only its division, but be unblemished against the rest of its opponents as well, this late into the season has a good chance to be the last team standing at the end of 60 minutes.

The 1985 Bears were a dominant team. The 2007 New England Patriots appear to be in that same caliber of dominance. While the Bears dominated their opponents defensively, the Patriots are dominating offensively.

The key is the dominance - being undefeated and being that much better than everyone leads to clinching early; playing better than everyone else will lead to an early clinch, but does not indicate there is enough gas to be the very best at the end of the season.

It's not enough to win the division early - a team has to be dominant the rest of the way.