Is John Harbaugh the Only Coach Left in the AFC Who Can Keep Up With Bill Belichick?

Going into their playoff matchup this weekend, John Harbaugh finds himself on the short list of AFC coaches that have been able to find regular postseason success against Bill Belichick. Scott Halleran/Getty Images, Elise Amendola/AP

By Jeff Pini

January 6, 2015

3 minutes to read

Over his tenure as coach of the Patriots, Bill Belichick has proven time and time again to be the best at what he does. In 15 seasons at the helm in Foxborough, Belichick has guided the Pats to remarkable success, including three Super Bowl titles, and a perennial place among the NFL’s elite teams.

But with a decade passing since the last time the Patriots hoisted the Lombardi Trophy, other AFC coaches have rose to challenge the hoodie for conference supremacy, with most holding a mixed bag of success.

One, however, has shown that he can go toe-to-toe with Belichick and beat the Patriots when it matters most: John Harbaugh.

When Harbaugh was named coach of the Baltimore Ravens in 2008, Bill Belichick was the undisputed best coach in the NFL. Since taking over the Patriots in 2000, Belichick had coached the team to a 91-37 regular season record; claimed six AFC East titles; taken them to four Super Bowls; won three championships; and came within an insane David Tyree miracle catch of becoming the first team since the 1972 Miami Dolphins to go undefeated and win the Super Bowl.

A 10-year assistant with the Philadelphia Eagles, the Ravens job was the first head coaching gig of Harbaugh’s career, at the pro or college level. He found success right away, however, as Harbaugh led the Ravens to the AFC Championship Game in his first season, falling to the eventual Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers.

Harbaugh got his first crack at the Patriots in the postseason the next year when the 9-7 Ravens flew to Foxborough for a Wild Card matchup, and for the first time in the Brady-Belichick era, the Patriots were completed blown away in a home playoff game, as Baltimore rattled off 24 unanswered points in the first quarter en route to a 33-14 embarrassment of the Patriots at Gillette Stadium.

Since his first playoff test against the Patriots, Harbaugh has proven more than capable whenever – and wherever – he coaches. Of the 14 playoff games John Harbaugh has coached with the Ravens, just two have been played in Baltimore, while the rest were going into hostile environments (with Super Bowl XLVII being played at a neutral site).

A great deal of that success has come directly against the Boys of Belichick. Including the aforementioned 2009 Wild Card game, the Ravens are 2-1 when playing the Patriots in the playoffs over the past five seasons, with two blowout wins and one touchdown drop/shanked chip shot field goal from that record being 3-0 – with all games being played at Gillette Stadium.

Just this past week, Harbaugh and the Ravens, having barely made the playoffs after needing help to even qualify for the postseason, went into a rocking Heinz Field in Pittsburgh, where the Ravens had lost all three of their previous playoff matchups. The result was a 30-17 beating of the favored Steelers to earn a trip to Foxborough this Saturday for a bout with the No. 1-seeded Patriots.

Harbaugh has shown that he has the ability to rebuild a defense that lacked an identity following the retirement of Ray Lewis and departure of Ed Reed, two players that had been staples of a fierce Ravens defense for a decade.

Harbaugh has shown that he has no qualms about playing on the road, and even thrives in enemy territory.

And, most of all, Harbaugh has shown more than any other coach in the AFC that he is not afraid of Bill Belichick and the big, bad Patriots. He knows what it takes to beat them and he knows what it takes to win in Foxborough.

There is little reason for these well-rounded Patriots to fear this Ravens team that will take the field at Gillette this weekend, but if you could inject some Pats players with truth serum, they’d probably say they wished it were Chuck Pagano or Marvin Lewis standing on the far sideline instead of Harbaugh come Saturday.