Jets go from Black Hole to 1st place

The final scoreboard at Oakland Coliseum read 45-20 late on the afternoon of Sept. 17. The Jets had just wilted in the second half against a superior Raiders team. They allowed 25 points and nearly 130 rushing yards in the third and fourth quarters. Todd Bowles’ squad looked far from a unified team ready to rattle off an unlikely winning streak.

And yet consistently over the past three weeks, as the Jets have won three games in a row to move into a tie for first place in the AFC East with the Patriots and Bills, players and coaches have referred back to halftime of the Raiders game as a turning point for the young group.

That message was repeated yet again Monday, as the Jets rehashed Sunday’s narrow 17-14 victory over the Browns in Cleveland and looked ahead to a division game against New England next weekend at MetLife Stadium.

“When we were in the locker room at halftime, guys were really together and were stating their messages. It’s just the belief and the confidence and the unity was there, and you could feel it,” defensive lineman Leonard Williams said on a conference call.

The Jets heard all the criticism and all the talk of tanking heading into 2017, and there’s no question they’ve rallied together in defiance of that negative noise.

The result has been an improbable 3-2 start to 2017. But the true test comes Sunday in East Rutherford against the Patriots, a team that handed Bowles and Co. a 41-3 shellacking on Christmas Eve last season at Gillette Stadium.

The Patriots have underperformed through five weeks, but after winning in Tampa on Thursday, Belichick will have extended time to prepare, and that usually means bad news for Patriots opponents.

“They’re scary because they’re still winning. They’re still the same Patriots,” Bowles said. “You got to knock them off the ladder. They’re the kings of the division right now. They won the Super Bowl.”

Belichick offered similar respect in his conference call with reporters Monday.

“You’ve got to be impressed with what the Jets have done,” he said. “I have a lot of respect for Coach Bowles and the job that he does down there and the way that they’ve been playing.”