By Braden Campbell

Boston.com Staff | 12.21.14 | 7:45 AM

With 4:46 to go in the third quarter last Sunday, Patriots long-snapper Danny Aiken took the field with the rest of the kicking unit.

He lined up at Miamis 18-yard-line and snapped the ball to Ryan Allen, who deftly set it for Stephen Gostkowskis 35-yard field goal.

It wasnt until minutes later, when the announcement rang out over stadium PA, that Aiken knew what hed just been part of: The points were Gostkowskis 1,158th, 1,159th and 1,160thtwo more than Adam Vinatieri had scored in his illustrious career, and the most by anyone in team history.

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Gostkowski knew going in he was just a few points shy of breaking the record, but in that moment, he said, it was the furthest thing from his mind. Because to achieve the success he has, you have to learn to tune things out, whether those things are the roar of the crowd, an angry rusher, or history.

If you really just worry about what it takes to make a kick, and not worry about the scenarios and everything going on around it, the better off you are, he said. I think the less things I think about while Im out there, the better I fare.

Gostkowski would kick two more extra points that quarter and another field goal in the fourth, padding his team record to 1,165 points, and counting.

That game was the latest in whats been a brilliant season for the kicker. Hes 31 for 33 on field goals and a perfect 49 of 49 on extra points; at this point, Gostkowski is as close as it gets to automatic. But making it look so easy is really, really hard.

Read more:
Zen and the Art of Kicking Field Goals