After the Steelers pulled off the upset against the Ravens on Sunday night, the league announced the NFL Schedule for next weekend’s Wild Card Weekend matchups.
Things will kick off on Saturday with the Rams and Panthers facing off at 4:30pm ET, while the night game will see the Packers and Bears kick off at 8:00pm ET.
On Sunday, there are three games on tap. At 1:00pm, the Bills and Jaguars will play the first game of the day, followed by San Francisco and Philadelphia at 4:30pm.
As for the Patriots schedule, their upcoming battle with the Chargers is set for next Sunday night at Gillette Stadium on Sunday Night Football.
Things will then finish up on Monday night, with the Texans battling the Steelers in Pittsburgh at 8:00pm.
This marks the second straight prime time match-up for the Patriots in the postseason, with New England last appearing in a Saturday night showdown out in Buffalo during what turned out to be a 47-17 Wild Card exit at the end of the 2021 season.
This time around, New England is at least at home at Gillette Stadium, with Drake Maye and company looking to come away with the first postseason victory for the Patriots since 2018.
In fact, the last time the Patriots beat the Chargers in the postseason was back in 2018 during the Divisional round in a 41-28 win en route to a Super Bowl Championship that year.
Unlike New England, the Chargers have limped into the postseason having lost two straight, including a 19-3 defeat in Denver on Sunday. Meanwhile, the Patriots have won three in a row, including 13 of their last 14.
New England is currently in the middle of a two game losing streak against the Chargers, having lost two straight games at home against them in recent years. They fell to them 6-0 in 2023 and 40-7 last season. In last year’s match-up, Maye was just 12-of-22 for 117 yards and one touchdown.
Still, this team has come a long way from where they were in that Week 17 contest, and the hope is that this will be a much different match-up than the lackluster effort we saw in that game.
For now, they’ll spend this week getting ready for what will hopefully be a deep playoff run. They also got some reinforcements back on Sunday after both Will Campbell and Milton Williams each returned to action during the win.
Head coach Mike Vrabel said after the game he’s looking forward to getting to work.
“We’ll get ready and get rolling and try to do what we do every week, which is prepare and figure out who we have available and what we feel like the keys are going to be and try to practice and be ready to go,” said Vrabel following Sunday’s 38-10 win over Miami. “That’s all we’ve done all year, and it’s all we’ll be able to do this week in the playoffs.”
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Ian Logue is a Seacoast native and owner and senior writer for PatsFans.com, an independent media site covering the New England Patriots and has been running this site in one form or another since 1997.
