01:40 PM EST on Monday, January 17, 2005

FOXBORO -- When Peyton Manning looked up at the heavens yesterday afternoon, he had to realize the Colts didn't have a prayer of beating the Patriots.

Journal photo / Glenn Osmundson

Even if he could stand the New England weather, Colts quarterback Peyton Manning probably couldn't stand playing against the Patriots.

As if on cue, snow started to fall about an hour before kickoff. With the wind-blown white stuff coming down, and coming down hard, the Patriots and their fans knew the Colts would be going down, and going down hard.

Not only do the Pats never lose to the Colts -- mostly because they're not only better, but also much smarter and a whole lot tougher -- but they never, ever lose in the snow.

The Patriots are the invincible snowmen. When the weather outside is frightful, the Pats are so delightful.

The Colts, on the other hand, are the abominable snowmen. They are out of their element when forced to play outside, in the elements, rather than in their comfy-cozy, climate-controlled dome, where the temperature is moderate, the wind is nonexistent, and the footing is always perfect.

In adverse conditions yesterday, it was the New England defense that was near-perfect.

The Colts led the league in scoring this season, averaging 32.6 points a game. They looked unstoppable in last week's playoff opener, routing the Broncos, 49-24. Manning set an NFL regular-season record by passing for 49 touchdowns, and threw

four more in the romp over Denver.

Against a New England defense that was without its best defensive lineman, all-pro end Richard Seymour, and cornerback Ty Law, who intercepted Manning three times in last year's AFC Championship Game, the Colts failed to get the ball into the end zone even once.

The only points they put up came on a field goal at the end of the first half by Mike "Vanderjerk" (as Pats safety Rodney Harrison calls him), who last week pronounced the Patriots "ripe for the picking."

Which certainly was brash, but, considering New England's injury-riddled defense, may have been accurate. The problem, however, is that the Colts apparently can't pick with frozen fingers.

As if playing the Patriots wasn't enough to send chills up Manning's spine -- they are, as Pedro Martinez would say, his "daddy," having beaten him 10 of 12 times, including all seven times he's played in Foxboro, and both times they've met in the playoffs -- the weather was further cause for him to shiver, not in anticipation, but in trepidation.

Now, once again, the only time you'll see Manning on Super Bowl Sunday is in television commercials.

In the second half, as both the Colts and the yard lines faded in the snow flurries, Patriots fans taunted Manning by chanting a line from one of his several TV ads: "Cut that meat! Cut that meat!"

The Pats made the Colts look like chopped liver yesterday.

It wasn't just the New England defense that frustrated Manning yesterday. The Patriots offense kept him off the field for extended periods of time by putting together one long scoring drive after another.

They had a 16-play, 78-yarder that consumed 9:07 and ended with a 24-yard field goal early in the second quarter. Late in the third quarter, they had a 15-play, 87-yard drive that took 8:16 and ended with a 5-yard touchdown pass from Tom Brady to David Givens. The clincher came in the fourth quarter, when the Pats drove 94 yards in 14 plays and 7:24 to another touchdown, Brady sneaking over from the 1 after Corey Dillon had rambled for 27 yards before being pushed out of bounds at the goal line.

Dillon was dominating, racking up 144 yards on 23 carries -- he had a 42-yard run in the second quarter -- as the Patriots controlled the ball for 37:43.

"We had some nice long drives," Brady said. "The time of possession was heavily in our favor, which we thought was really critical."

What also was critical was that the Patriots didn't have any turnovers against an Indianapolis defense that led the league in takeaways.

The New England defense, on the other hand, came up with three turnovers -- recovering two fumbles, and then intercepting Manning in the closing seconds.

"For our defense to hold those guys to three points -- what an unbelievable effort," Brady said.

"They put up some amazing numbers," Pats defensive back Asante Samuel said of Manning and the Colts, "but the best way to play them is to be physical, to be aggressive."

"It's all about rhythm," linebacker Mike Vrabel said. "We tried to put our hands on their receivers early in their routes and get them moving in directions they didn't want to go."

"We were bumping them the whole game," said cornerback Eugene Wilson. "We didn't want to let them run free. We wanted to bring the game to them. Our linebackers did a good job of jamming them at the line of scrimmage, and (the defensive backs) played over the top.

"We tried to disguise our coverages, to make it look like we were playing one thing when we actually were playing another. We wanted to get Peyton looking from side-to-side, confuse him a little bit."

"We had a great plan," Vrabel said. "The coaches came up with some great stuff -- different looks, stuff they hadn't seen from us before."

The Patriots also showed, as they have so many times before, that they have the right stuff, the stuff of champions.

As Colts coach Tony Dungy said: "They are physical, they are tough and they are smart."

"We've got a lot of tough guys in that locker room," Pats coach Bill Belichick. said. "That was an awesome performance."

That it was.

Now the Patriots once again are heading to Pittsburgh for the AFC Championship Game, while the Colts, yet again, are left out in the cold.