FOXBORO — The Patriots received their AFC East champions hats and T-shirts on Sunday, but it had to wait until they got off the bus back from the airport to Gillette Stadium.

Since the Patriots beat the Jets on Sunday, they needed the Bills to lose to the Eagles to be crowned divisional champs. Players were crowded around devices on the bus ride back to the stadium when they received the good news.

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“It was great,” head coach Mike Vrabel said. “Everybody was kind of watching on their phones or following along. I think the timing of it worked out well, that the Eagles were able to win, and then we were able to kind of time it up here, and have the hats and the T-shirts here ready to go pretty quickly. And so, I appreciate that, and Stick [equipment manager Preston Rogers]’s crew having that ready to go. Players enjoyed it. Staff enjoyed it. I thought it was perfect timing, and then everybody kind of went on their way.”

The moment we became division champs pic.twitter.com/ImKStCRsjH

— z – New England Patriots (@Patriots) December 29, 2025

The Bills scored a touchdown late against the Eagles to cut Philadelphia’s lead to 13-12. Rather than tie the game with an extra point to go into overtime, they attempted a failed two-point conversion, when quarterback Josh Allen’s pass to Khalil Shakir sailed through the end zone.

The Patriots posed for a group picture in a garage at Gillette Stadium upon exiting the buses.

“Seeing the ball roll and not go their way, it was a great feeling just to be surrounded by all the guys,” left tackle Vederian Lowe said. “We put in so much work this entire season, from Day 1 OTAs to the game yesterday. We still got a lot to do, but it felt really good to be division champs.”

Outside linebacker K’Lavon Chaisson joked that it was his first time rooting for the Eagles.

“Excited for that, excited for the opportunity,” Chaisson said. “And the energy was pretty high, for sure.”

It’s the Patriots’ first AFC East title since 2019, when Tom Brady was still quarterback and Vrabel was head coach of the Titans. No players remain from that year’s team.

“It was about 15 minutes to get a picture, the shirt’s passed out, the hat’s passed out and the pictures organized, but other than that, back to work, focused on the Dolphins, focused on who we may have and a plan that we’ll have to try to put together to improve,” Vrabel said.

The Patriots can still earn the No. 1 seed in the AFC with a win over the 7-9 Dolphins and a Broncos loss to the 11-5 Chargers. The Broncos and Patriots are both 13-3, but the Broncos get the tiebreaker because they have a better record against common opponents.