FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- The easy explanation is after 11 straight victories the Kansas City Chiefs collapsed at the end of their road, unable to muster the energy to do the things that brought them to the divisional round of the playoffs.

There’s some truth to that. The Chiefs were battered and bruised and limping toward what became their finish line.

But a more accurate storyline is the Chiefs had their season ended by a superior opponent. The New England Patriots beat the Chiefs 27-20 simply by preventing the Chiefs from being the team that won 11 straight games.

"That certainly is a big, big part of it," quarterback Alex Smith said. "They’re a good football team, had a good plan against us and came out and executed.

"It’s tough in a game like this. I mean, it’s this time of year. You’ve got injuries and guys banged up. Both sides are dealing with it and trying to deal with it. So it’s certainly not an excuse. They came out and all together they were better, executed better and certainly had a good plan versus us and we weren’t able to make the adjustments fast enough."

New England forced the Chiefs into scramble mode early. The Patriots took the opening kickoff and moved 80 yards for a touchdown to put the Chiefs in a hole. The Patriots converted twice on third down and at least 10 yards, situations where the Chiefs had been strangling their opponents.

So the Chiefs were immediately in an unfamiliar spot. They had failed to score first in just three of those 11 games and not at all in their last five.

The Chiefs had plenty of time to rally but got away offensively from the things they prefer to do because they were consistently chasing the Patriots. Smith threw 50 passes, five more than he had thrown in any game this season and 18 more than in any game during the winning streak.

"When you get down in the ballgame it kind of takes you out of what you do best," wide receiver Jason Avant said.

The Chiefs committed the game’s only turnover, a Knile Davis fumble that killed a promising third-quarter drive. That meant the Chiefs lost the turnover battle, unusual for them during their winning streak. The Chiefs also failed to force a turnover for the first time since before the winning streak began.

The Chiefs went into the game among the league leaders in sacks. But they never got to Brady and hit him only once, late in the game when he was flattened by Dee Ford after throwing a pass. Otherwise, the Chiefs’ biggest hit on Brady came on Dezman Moses' roughing the quarterback penalty.

"Their ship runs through Brady, and he did a great job," linebacker Derrick Johnson said. "He hit some long third downs in the first half and that kind of put the stake in us early and we were playing from behind. It’s hard to play against Brady when you’re behind.

"He got the ball out quick. When we took away his first look he (still) got the ball out fast. He always has an answer."

Until Saturday, the Chiefs were the ones with the answers. But, confronted by injuries that limited wide receiver Jeremy Maclin and linebacker Justin Houston to part-time status and an opponent that knows how to get things done, Kansas City finally came up empty.

"You’ve got to hand it to the Patriots," Avant said. "They had a great game plan for us. I wish we would have had a couple of more healthy people on our team. I’m not taking away from them. They’re dealing with injuries, too, and they overcame them."