INDIANAPOLIS – One year from now, the Colts hope they are spending their first full week of February celebrating a Super Bowl L Championship.
To reach that height, players and coaches know the challenges that are filled throughout an NFL season.
In 2014, just one team stood in the Colts path of the season's final game.
It was the same team who ended the Colts run in 2013.
"If you want to be the champ, you've got to beat the champ, and we haven't done it. So we've got to find a way," Chuck Pagano said when asked about the New England Patriots' presence.
Highlights from the Colts vs Patriots AFC Championship game.
Next season, the Colts will once again host the Patriots for a regular season matchup, one that will almost assuredly fall in a primetime slot.
A 17th Colts/Patriots meeting since 2003 will highlight the 2015 schedule for the AFC finalist.
That game has a pretty good chance to serve as not only one with playoff implications for those teams, but who could host an eventual postseason contest.
"They are going to be here in our way every year and we are going to have come through them," Dwayne Allen said of the Patriots.
"Whether it's offensively, defensively, special teams, we are going to have to do something different in order to get a different result. We can't keep doing the same thing."
In Ryan Grigson's end of the season press conference, he faced the "Patriots hurdle" question.
The Colts General Manager pointed out how the Chicago Bulls had to get past the Detroit Pistons before they reigned atop the NBA.
The Colts are at a similar crossroads.
New England is the defending Super Bowl Champions and the Colts are ready to get through that roadblock.
"They certainly are the class of the AFC, and to get there, you're going to have to go through them," Andrew Luck said.
"We're going to have to figure it out. We will figure it out, but they're a heck of a team."
