It’s a five-part formula for winning in the NFL regular season, too, but the need for it to be successful in the postseason is ratcheted up 100 times more.

You saw it over the weekend in the four divisional round playoff games.

That is, the team that wins:

*Has better quarterback play and, almost always, a known better quarterback heading into the game. Again, quarterback is the most important position in team sports, and if you have a good one, then you have a good chance to win. And if you don’t, then you don’t. That’s why teams jump through hoops to get a quarterback on whom they can depend.

*Wins the turnover battle. There are mistakes, and then there are egregious mistakes. They’re called turnovers. They are gifts to your opponent, and a recipe for disaster for you.

*Makes plays when they are there to be made, especially in the fourth quarter, and specifically late in the fourth quarter, when the vast majority of these games are decided. Indeed, it’s not necessarily how you start a game. Rather, it’s how you finish it.

*Has a roster full of players who do their job, no matter how small that task may be viewed in the vast scheme of things. At some point during the game, the success of a play will depend on that job being carried out correctly. Bill Belichick has lived by this mantra throughout his career, and it has worked out pretty well for him and his clubs.

*Is aggressive and forces the action, dictating the flow of the game. Being complacent and reactive is a half-hearted effort in everything except planning on, and preparing to, lose.

Steve King