01:00 AM EST on Wednesday, January 28, 2004

HOUSTON -- Tom Jackson loves the Patriots.

The same Patriots that he had insisted, while staring earnestly into the camera on ESPN's pre-game show the second week of the season, hated their coach.

Rod Smart, a return specialist for the Carolina Panthers, became famous when he played for the Las Vegas Express of the now-defunct XFL because he wore a jersey that, instead of having his name on the back, read: "He Hate Me."

The way Jackson was talking, back in mid-September, the Patriots should have come on to the field in Philadelphia to play the Eagles wearing jerseys that said: "We Hate Him."

"Him," in this case, being Bill Belichick, who the week before the season opener at Buffalo, had released popular veteran defensive back Lawyer Milloy. The Bills quickly signed Milloy, who was in the lineup to help pound the Patriots, 31-0.

At which point Jackson wondered on the air whether Belichick had lost not only the game, but his team as well.

As it turned out, the Patriots lost only one more game all season, and have rattled off 14 wins in a row on the way to their second Super Bowl appearance in three years.

" 'Hate' may have been too strong a word," Jackson conceded yesterday morning while sitting in the stands at Reliant Stadium, watching Belichick and the Patriots being interviewed during the first full-scale gathering of massed media prior to Super Bowl XXXVIII.

"I thought they were really struggling with the Lawyer Milloy situation," Jackson said. "But they did a tremendous job getting past what was a difficult situation. To their credit, it was amazing that they got by it as quickly as they did and were able to lock in again on their goal."

Their goal, of course, was the Super Bowl, and Jackson is delighted to see the Patriots back in the NFL's championship game again.

"One my favorite moments in Super Bowl history," he said, "was two years ago when the Patriots were introduced. There aren't many moments when the hair on the back of your neck actually stands up. But when the Patriots came out as a team for pre-game introductions, that was one of those moments.

"Everybody wants to be introduced individually at the Super Bowl. I thought right then, even though the Patriots were big underdogs, that they had a good chance to win, because they had a mindset going for them that the Rams didn't have.

"They've got that kind of chemistry again," Jackson said. "They don't care who gets the catches, or the yards or the touchdowns. You never hear a receiver complain because he doesn't get the ball more. You never hear Antowain Smith say he needs to run more. You don't hear Tom Brady saying he ought to be throwing more passes. They play as a team. All they care about is winning."

The biggest reason the Patriots have compiled the second-longest, single-season winning streak in NFL history is their defense, which allowed a league-low of just 14.9 points a game.

Jackson says New England's defense reminds him very much of the ones he played on in Denver, where he was a three-time Pro Bowler at linebacker.

Which shouldn't be all that surprising, considering that Belichick served as an assistant to Joe Collier, Denver's longtime defensive coordinator, in 1978.

"What (the Patriots do) is very much like our 'Orange Crush' defense," said Jackson. "Much of what Bill Belichick does, he picked up from Joe Collier -- switching back-and-forth between the 3-4 and the 4-3, the weak-side blitzes, the strong-side blitzes, adjusting on the fly. We were always a bend-but-don't-break defense that forced other teams to adjust to what we were doing. Both defenses pressure teams in ways they're not used to."

Even such novel things as Belichick does with versatile linebacker Mike Vrabel -- who sometimes lines up as a down lineman, sometimes drops into pass coverage, sometimes is employed as a run-stuffer, and at others rushes the passer from a standing position at outside linebacker -- all those things were done in Denver with Karl Mecklenburg.

"Mecklenburg used to do all that stuff," Jackson said. "At the time he was playing, there was nobody better at it."

Nobody is playing better right now than Belichick's Patriots.

"They clearly understand their mission, which is to keep guys out of the end zone," Jackson said.

And Jackson has come to understand that while the Patriots may not exactly love Belichick, they certainly respect him. And they sure as heck play hard for him.