Quinn Nordin stars as Patriots welcome fans back to Gillette Stadium

Mac Jones surveyed the field from the pocket, found Jonnu Smith running on a short crossing route and fired. Smith snared it and strolled into the end zone, eliciting cheers from the Patriots season ticketholders lining the stands at Gillette Stadium for the team’s in-stadium practice.

You’ll want to hold on to the last part of that paragraph more than anything else. That throw, along with just about every other snap, took place at around a quarter of the speed it normally would during the team’s training camp practices. No one was in pads, either.

Let’s face it: the on-field action at Gillette Stadium Friday night wasn’t the story.

It was the fact that fans once more got to see the New England Patriots play something resembling professional football for the first time since January of 2020 — two months before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down large swaths of the country.

“You’re the backbone,” Patriots owner Robert Kraft told the season ticket-holders in attendance during a break in the action, noting it had been 580 days since they’d been able to watch their favorite team play a football game in person.

“That’s not the only reason you play the game but that’s definitely part of the reason: the energy in the crowd,” center David Andrews said after the practice. “It makes it all fun.”

Despite the pageantry of splitting into intra-squad teams – with Cam Newton leading Team White and Jones leading Team Blue – the goal of the scrimmage seemed to be more about walking things through than competing.

Both teams ran a few light 11-on-11 segments that ended with punts or field goals. Then, the offenses got chances to run two-minute drills and hurry-up situations with the clock winding down at the end of quarters.

In one moment of (mostly) comedy, Newton threw a ball for a jogging Hunter Henry that was picked off in the end zone by J.C. Jackson (because when isn’t J.C. Jackson getting his hands on a Newton pass these days?).

Special teams captain Matthew Slater even iced kicker Quinn Nordin during a short field goal attempt with 0:02 left on the game clock, forcing him to stew on the kick at hand. He made it anyway.

Speaking of which, the star of Friday’s practice: Nordin, by far.

With no Nick Folk for the second day in a row, the undrafted rookie handled all the team’s field goal-kicking duties and was perfect on 10 tries. That included closing out the practice with a booming 57-yard make that would’ve been good from 60-plus yards and a 55-yarder to end the session going the other way.

The cannon of a leg has been on display from the moment the team started spring practice. Proving he can put the ball through the uprights consistently could actually give the Patriots a reason to consider him in their future plans.

Other highlights included: Jones’s multiple touchdown throws to the tight end Smith, including two high throws over the top of a lightly pursuing Kyle Dugger; and Newton gathering the offense around after a touchdown pass, tossing the ball in the air and having everyone tumble to the ground when it landed.

In addition to the expected slate of PUP absences and recent injury holdouts like Ted Karras and Christian Barmore (who were both on the sideline watching the action), New England did not have running back Brandon Bolden or safety Adrian Colbert on the field for undisclosed reasons.

The Patriots will return to “actual football” on Sunday after a day off Saturday.