Patriots vs. Chiefs: Final Odds, Spread Picks for AFC Championship Game 2019

In order to extend their reign atop the AFC, the New England Patriots have to beat one of the best young players in the NFL and a head coach hungry to win his first Super Bowl in Sunday's AFC Championship Game.

The Patriots are 10-4 all time in the AFC Championship Game, with eight of those victories coming under head coach Bill Belichick.

However, New England has suffered three AFC Championship defeats on the road since Tom Brady and Belichick took control of the AFC, which gives the top-seeded Chiefs hope they can return to the Super Bowl for the first time since 1970.

The Patriots won the regular-season meeting between the teams by three points in Week 6, and given the talent on both rosters and preparedness of each coach, the margin of victory is expected to be small once again Sunday.

AFC Championship Odds

Odds according to OddsShark.

Spread: Kansas City -3

Over/Under: 56 

Spread Picks

New England +3

The margin of error is going to be remarkably thin Sunday night, as both teams will try to take advantage of the smallest mistakes made by their opponent.

Since the Week 6 game at Gillette Stadium was close, we're expecting an even tighter one-possession game between the Chiefs and Patriots.

Although the Patriots will cover the spread, we're going with an outright Chiefs win by two points.

In three of their past seven AFC Championship Games, the Patriots have been involved in one-score games, and in their most recent defeat at this stage of the postseason, they fell by two points to the Denver Broncos in 2016.

Even though the Patriots will be prepared to throw anything at Patrick Mahomes, the first-year starter will find enough space in the New England secondary to achieve success.

In Week 6, Mahomes led the Chiefs to 40 points by throwing for 352 yards and four touchdowns, but the one number that stands out from that stat line is the two interceptions he threw.

Charlie Neibergall/Associated Press

As long as Mahomes avoids turnovers, Kansas City should be in position to win the game late in the fourth quarter.

But there's always the threat of Brady leading a game-winning scoring drive in the fourth quarter.

Kansas City's defense might be playing with fire in the final 15 minutes with the game so close, but it will find a way to make a late stop.

By holding off the threat posed by Brady in the fourth, the Chiefs pull out one of the tightest wins in AFC Championship Game history to give head coach Andy Reid a shot to win his first Super Bowl.

Over 56

It's not a bad idea to base your over/under prediction on the output of both teams from Week 6.

In addition to the 83-point total from their head-to-head meeting, the Patriots and Chiefs combined to score 72 points in the divisional round.

Adam Glanzman/Getty Images

Since losing 54-51 to the Los Angeles Rams in Week 11, the Chiefs have scored at least 27 points in each of their past six games.

In the same time frame, the Patriots reached 24 points in all but one of their games, when they scored 10 points against Pittsburgh in Week 15.

As much as we would love to take the risk of betting the under, the potential of Brady and Mahomes leading their respective teams down the field on countless occasions sounds amazing.

Mahomes turned in an MVP-caliber season with more than 5,000 passing yards, while Brady is coming off his second-best performance of the season, as he tore apart the Los Angeles Chargers secondary for 343 yards.

The Chiefs quarterback should do most of his damage through the air by targeting Tyreek Hill and Travis Kelce, with Sammy Watkins potentially playing a key role.

Brady relies on James White out of the backfield, and he has plenty of other quality options to throw to, including Julian Edelman and Rob Gronkowski.

As both quarterbacks settle into a rhythm in the pocket and pick out their favorite targets, the score will rise and the over will hit in the middle of the second half.

After the over hits, you will get to spend the majority of the fourth quarter sweating out the wager you made on the point spread.

Follow Joe on Twitter, @JTansey90.