Patriots' Josh McDaniels clarifies use of ineligible receivers on offense

Some creative offensive sets used by the New England Patriots earlier in the playoffs still have many wondering if the plays in question were in fact legal.

When asked Wednesday about the unit's substitution packages and use of ineligible receivers, offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels clarified that the Patriots huddled in each instance, allowing the defense time to make its adjustments, according to ESPN's Mike Reiss.

One thing about that that I'd like to clear up is we didn't do any of those things (with ineligible receivers) without huddling. When we did those things the last couple of games, we huddled every time we did it with the ineligible player. We substituted, we huddled, we declared him ineligible, the official declared him ineligible, and then we lined up.

The Patriots could try their luck with similar substitution packages again in Sunday's Super Bowl, but it would be no surprise to see the Seattle Seahawks' top-ranked defense prepared for it well in advance.