The New England Patriots were down 20-10 early in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s A.F.C. Championship game. Little had worked for the Patriots all day, but like Tom Brady has so many times over the years, the 40-year-old quarterback kept his cool and led the Patriots to a 24-20 victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars. It would have been shocking for any other team and quarterback, but seemed par for the course in this case.

With the win, Brady will go to the Super Bowl for the eighth time in his 18-year career, and he will be in search of his sixth career championship. The Patriots will face the winner of Sunday night’s N.F.C. Championship game between the Minnesota Vikings and the Philadelphia Eagles.

For the Jaguars to get so close only to fall apart after a Cinderella-like season seemed especially cruel, with Blake Bortles outplaying Brady for much of the game only to have New England make some tremendous second-half adjustments that essentially eliminated Jacksonville’s offense from the game.

New England and Brady survived losing their top receiver, Rob Gronkowski, to a concussion in the first half on a brutal helmet-to-helmet collision with Jacksonville’s hard-hitting safety Barry Church. Gronkowski came up from the hit looking disoriented and was immediately taken to the locker room for evaluation, being ruled out for the rest of the game shortly after.