FOXBOROUGH, Mass. (AP) – The New England Patriots won’t be surprised Sunday when the Miami Dolphins use the Wildcat formation they unveiled when the teams met two months ago.

That doesn’t mean those plays will be easy to stop.

“I don’t think it’s going to be a surprise when Ronnie Brown lines up behind the center and takes the snap,” Patriots coach Bill Belichick said Monday, “but what the rest of the formation will be, what the blocking will be, what they’ll do out of it, that’s not always the same every week.”

The Dolphins used that Wildcat formation for the first time in the third game and stunned the Patriots 38-13 in Foxborough.

They’ve continued to use it and likely will run plays out of it Sunday when the teams meet in Miami in a game that may mean more to New England.

Both teams are 6-4 and tied for second place in the AFC East, one game behind the New York Jets. But if the Dolphins win, they would be 2-0 against the Patriots and have an edge in the first tiebreaker – head-to-head-competition – for a playoff berth.

Miami won just one game last season but dominated New England on Sept. 21, giving new coach Tony Sparano his first NFL win.

They did it with Brown running for four touchdowns and throwing for another, with four of them coming on direct snaps to him rather than quarterback Chad Pennington.

In Sunday’s 17-15 win over Oakland, the Dolphins’ fourth straight, they gained 52 yards on 10 runs from the Wildcat formation.

“It’s definitely part of their offense,” Belichick said during a conference call. “They run it every week. It’s still hard to stop.

“You can look at any good offensive team in this league or in any league and they’ll run the same plays every week, but that doesn’t mean they get stopped. They continue to work because they have great players and great execution, and that’s true with Miami.”

They also work when the defense doesn’t tackle well.

That was a problem in the first matchup and, combined with the element of surprise, contributed to the lopsided result.

“They did a good job of coming in with a scheme that nobody had really kind of seen or prepared for and caught us (off guard) a little bit,” defensive coordinator Dean Pees said. “At the same time, we have to do a better job of tackling because there were some plays in there that we had the play made and we just didn’t tackle.”

At least the Patriots have plenty of time to prepare. Their last game was Thursday night, a 34-31 overtime loss to the Jets in which they let Brett Favre direct the only possession of the extra session, lasting 14 plays and 7:50 and ending with Jay Feely’s 34-yard field goal.

The Dolphins had a similar winning drive Sunday.

In 10 plays, Pennington moved them 61 yards to set up Dan Carpenter’s decisive 38-yard field goal with 38 seconds left.

Against Oakland, Brown gained 101 yards on 16 carries and Ricky Williams picked up 49 on 13. The Dolphins scored on runs of 40 yards by Ted Ginn Jr. on an end-around and 10 yards by Patrick Cobbs.

“The (Wildcat) plays are not necessarily the answer to revolutionizing the game,” Belichick said, “but I think the execution and the integration of certain plays in with other things offensively that they do makes them a hard team to defend.”

The Patriots must get ready for all off that, no matter what the formation.

“Not every play is an 80-yard touchdown,” Belichick said, “but they consistently get production out of, really, just about everything they’re doing, with that package being part of it.”

One thing he won’t spend much time preparing for is a pass to Pennington when he splits wide.

“I don’t think the idea is to get him the ball too many times as a receiver,” Belichick said. “I would say of all the things you’ve got to defend, that would be at the bottom of the list.”

AP-ES-11-17-08 1646EST