FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- As New England Patriots coaches balance making corrections from Monday night's disappointing 27-20 loss to the Miami Dolphins while beginning preparations for Sunday's top-of-the-AFC showdown against the Pittsburgh Steelers, the disappearance of the running game was a notable topic during Tuesday's media conference calls.

The Patriots attempted 10 rushes against the Dolphins, with 43 pass attempts.

"We haven’t had any games this year where we've been that out of balance. That's never our intention," offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels said. "You never try to go into a game and be that imbalanced, and think you're going to do well against a good team."

Part of that was a result of falling behind early, and as quarterback Tom Brady said after the game, playing on the Dolphins' terms. Another part was going 0-for-11 on third down, marking the first time since 1991 that the Patriots didn't have a third-down conversion. Those failures denied them a chance for more plays to establish the ground attack.

Finally, it was simply a matter of production, which Bill Belichick didn't see enough of in the running game.

"The biggest problem with the running game is the production. Nobody around here minds calling running plays if we're gaining yardage on them. When we're not gaining yardage, it makes it hard to call them," Belichick said. "Combine that with the score and our inability to convert on third down, it’s kind of a spiral that you don't want to be in, and we were in it last night."

Dion Lewis had an 11-yard run, which was one of the few highlights in the running game, but as McDaniels said, "10 runs isn't a large enough sample size to say we were doing anything well. ... Give Miami credit."

Added Belichick, "There were a lot of factors that went into it, but the bottom line is that we didn't have a good night offensively in any area. We were probably fortunate to have the points we had."