GREEN BAY, Wis. -- On most Sunday nights or Monday mornings in previous years, Mike McCarthy’s phone blew up with messages. Beat the rival Chicago Bears, and the texts poured in. Win another NFC North title, and the phone calls came almost nonstop. And after Super Bowl XLV, well, it’s hard to believe Cellcom’s data network handled it all, even if the company’s most recognizable spokesperson has the best service plan.

Then came their four-game losing streak in 2016 that dropped the Green Bay Packers to 4-6 and put their season on the brink.

“Crickets,” McCarthy said with a smile, glancing at his phone.

Calls or texts were rare, if they came at all.

“You know who’s the best at [calling after losses], is Tom Crean,” McCarthy said of the Indiana University basketball coach and longtime confidant. “Tremendous friend that way.”

The company he keeps Mike McCarthy is one of just four coaches who have put together a streak of eight consecutive playoff appearances. 9 1975-1983 Tom Landry, Cowboys 8 1966-1973 Tom Landry, Cowboys 8 1972-1979 Chuck Noll, Steelers 8 2009-2016 Mike McCarthy, Packers 8 2009-2016 Bill Belichick, Patriots ESPN Stats & Information

Perhaps it took a coach to know what a coach in McCarthy’s situation was going through. One of the NFL’s most accomplished active head coaches was facing a mountain of criticism from just about anyone who had a platform -- social media to talk-radio callers to the army of NFL analysts (including ex-players and former coaches). They were questioning his every move, as if he is not one of four coaches in NFL history to lead a single franchise to eight or more consecutive playoff appearances. Bill Belichick, Tom Landry and Chuck Noll are the others.

So maybe it should not have come as a surprise that on Nov. 14, less than 24 hours after a 47-25 loss to the Tennessee Titans, McCarthy felt compelled to defend himself and his program.

“Let’s just state the facts: I’m a highly successful NFL head coach,” McCarthy said at the time.

Still, it seemed like an out-of-character move by McCarthy, who has said during his 11-year tenure as Packers coach that his No. 1 goal in news conferences is not to create questions that players have to answer.

When asked about that day on the eve of Sunday’s NFC wild-card playoff game against the New York Giants, McCarthy revealed in an interview with ESPN.com the true meaning in that remark.

“My instincts told me my team needed to hear it because no one else was saying it,” McCarthy said. “No one else was saying, ‘Hey, we have a great program here. We’re doing it the right way.’ These guys do it the right way. We all understand it’s about winning. But to get to winning -- and I’m qualified to talk on it -- you have to do things the right way, and they needed to hear that.”

McCarthy said he never referenced that remark again.

Back to work

Inside the coaches’ offices on the third floor at Lambeau Field, members of McCarthy’s staff worked just as they always had. The coach said he didn’t rant or rave in front of his assistants, and team president Mark Murphy and general manager Ted Thompson didn’t waver.

“I think it’s a real tremendous strength of ours,” McCarthy said. “Mark and Ted, it’s just business as usual. I never felt anything different.”

When Mike McCarthy walked off Lincoln Financial Field, the Packers' four-game losing streak was over and his phone started buzzing again. James Lang/USA TODAY Sports

And if anyone questioned how quarterback Aaron Rodgers felt about his coach, that too came through clearly. The same week when McCarthy made his “highly successful” remark, Rodgers called the criticism of his coach “ridiculous.”

“I think it shows the type of person he is,” McCarthy said of Rodgers. “I think the guy is misrepresented a lot publicly, and it’s a shame. He’s such a great teammate."

Their mutual admiration was on display again after Rodgers made his “run the table” remark. McCarthy said he loved the confidence Rodgers showed.

Then, after the Packers' NFC North-clinching win Sunday over the Detroit Lions completed the comeback from 4-6 to 10-6, Rodgers threw the bouquet back to McCarthy.

“I think that’s the great thing about this team and the leadership, is Mike stayed the path,” Rodgers said. “And when the storm was upon us, upon him, about his job and job security, about myself and my leadership and about our teammates and the way that we would respond to a four-game losing streak, we stuck together -- and I think it says a lot about the kind of people that we have in the organization and the kind of people we have in that locker room.”

From Rodgers to several members of McCarthy’s staff who spoke to reporters this week, all said the 53-year-old coach handled the losing streak and the criticism the same way.

“He was really positive,” Rodgers said. “I think if anything, after the Washington game (that dropped the Packers to 4-6), he became even more of a players’ coach. He was even more positive and listened even more, and just kept encouraging us that we were close to kind of getting over the hump and starting to win games. So he took some crap from everybody, but he stayed the course for us in the meeting room and the locker room.”

Said special-teams coordinator Ron Zook: “I can’t say enough about the job that Mike did because I just know from my own experience, the energy [it] takes and he gave it. And it was positive, not only with the coaching staff, but with the players as well. And he didn’t change. He was just, ‘Hey. This is what we’ve got to do. This is what we’ve got to get done.’ There was no, ‘Gosh, we’ve got this guy hurt.’ There was none of that. It was, ‘This is what we’ve got to do.’ You just do what you’ve got to do.

“Now, was it fun? No. But I just said, I think Mike did an unbelievable job, not only with the coaching staff, but with the team as well in terms of being positive. And sometimes it’s a lot harder to be that way than when things are going well.”

McCarthy actually disagreed with Zook's last point. Sure, this season provided plenty of challenges, but to McCarthy, it wasn’t as stressful as the 15-1 season in 2011 or the 13-3 season in 2007.

“When you’re losing, there’s that survival instinct,” McCarthy said. “But when you’re handling success, people think it’s easier and they think losing’s harder. But handling success to me always creates more issues. Are you in touch with reality? With perception?

“I just think it’s so much more of a challenge. At least from my position, I worry about it more when we’re rolling because people get comfortable. They leave work a little earlier. There’s a little more, when you make a mistake [you say], ‘Hey, I got it.’ When really, you ain’t got s---. I hate that ‘I got it’ stuff. That drives me nuts. It’s that natural instinct that everything’s OK because you’re winning.”

Back to the losing streak

A few days after the Packers lost at Washington to fall to 4-6, one of the few calls McCarthy got came from his wife, Jessica. With concern in her voice, she asked if everything was OK.

“I said, ‘Yeah, what’s going on?’” McCarthy recalled. “She said people were reaching out to her, like, ‘Hey, we’re so sorry this is going on.’ It was like someone died.

“I said, ‘Hey, everything’s going to be fine.’ She was just like, ‘I’m just checking on you.’ It was a two-minute conversation. That’s the only time that Jessica and I ever talked about it.”

The Packers beat the Eagles the following Monday night, and McCarthy’s phone began to light up again.