FOXBOROUGH – It was a little bit of a last day of school vibe at Gillette Stadium on Friday.

The Patriots both practiced and held media availability for the last time in Foxborough during this unimaginably special 2025 (into 2026) season. Keeping with tradition/superstition, Stacey James and the always impressive Pats PR staff had lobster rolls and more out for the large gathering in the media workroom.

Before that, right around noon, the media was escorted into the Win Waste Innovations Field House, where sudden realization started to spread throughout reporters and TV crews that Drake Maye was not present.

With speculation about the severity of a potential shoulder injury running rampant before The Big Game already, the absence certainly added fuel to the fire.

But, head coach Mike Vrabel was his normal calm, cool, collected self when peppered with questions immediately during his 1:10 p.m. press conference.

“He did not practice, no. It was illness and shoulder,” Vrabel said to Karen Gueregian’s first question.

Asked ‘illness?’ Vrabel quickly did his best Bill Belichick impression.

“Illness and shoulder,” he said.

Followed with a question about whether there was any concern on his part, Vrabel genuinely seemed unbothered by the current perceived situation.

“No. I mean, again, we’ve had a lot of guys over the last month or six weeks here with illness. So, again, trying to do what’s best for the player and the team. Try to take care of guys,” he added. “Don’t spread anything. But, again, we’ve worked through that here for the past six weeks.”

More Maye questions followed as to whether or not he was in the building on Friday. Vrabel said he was.

There were a few football questions before a uniform question gave everyone in the room quite a laugh and lasting memory from the final home press conference. After explaining how the decision was made (the leadership group of players made the call), ‘Moose’ from WBZ made sure Vrabel knew they’re 5-0 in the all white jersey.

“There we go. I hope the tooth fairy comes tonight, too. We’ll be real excited,” Vrabel smirked as the room howled.

Another exchange with Phil Perry seconds later almost matched the hilarity. It went like this:

Q: Are you guys going to practice tomorrow?

MV: Players are off tomorrow.

Q: I thought you guys treated today like a Thursday. I just assumed that meant tomorrow might be a Friday. Usually Friday –

MV: There can only be one Friday, and that’s going to be next Friday.

Q: What does that mean?

MV: That means there can only be one Friday, and it’s going to be next week. That’s why we turned the Friday music off.

Q: So, no weekend update?

MV: Absolutely not.

Vrabel never, ever changes, whether it’s Week 7 or days before the Super Bowl.

That could serve the Pats extremely well out in Santa Clara.

This young team has very little Super Bowl experience to fall back on from a roster standpoint. Vrabel not only won three rings, but thrived in each of those Super Bowl victories. No one in the building – besides Josh McDaniels – knows what these two weeks look and feel like better than he does.

If a team does in fact follow the lead of its head coach – and the Patriots have all season – a quiet, unwavering confidence and belief instead of nervousness or anxiousness is traveling out to California on Sunday.