Van Noy: Patriots' culture will help team overcome offseason losses
The New England Patriots may have lost several key players from their Super Bowl-winning squad, but linebacker Kyle Van Noy believes the team's culture will help it sustain success in 2019.
"Bill (Belichick) does a really good job of the culture being set with the players that have been there for their tenures," Van Noy told NFL Network's "Total Access" this week when speaking to former Patriots star Willie McGinnest, via NFL.com's Kevin Patra. "Like Patrick Chung, Dont'a Hightower, Devin McCourty, Tom (Brady), they've been there for a while, Matthew Slater. Those guys have already been passed on from your generation, the standard. And we're just trying to keep that legacy going.
"When that culture is set, it doesn't matter, we all have the same goal in mind and that's just to win."
New England lost star tight end Rob Gronkowski to retirement this offseason, along with multiple starters from 2018, including Trent Brown, Trey Flowers, Malcom Brown, and Chris Hogan.
The Patriots also lost their defensive coordinator for a second straight year when Brian Flores was hired as the Miami Dolphins' new head coach.
Van Noy is now excited for Belichick to lead the defense.
"I think for me, anytime you get to learn from one of the best ever to do it - to me, he's the best - to learn from him each and every day, to have that mindset in your meetings all the time, getting you information and things that you normally don't see, you get in his mind a little bit, it's the best," he said.
Belichick's squad has captured the AFC East title in each of the last 10 campaigns, and in 15 of the last 16.