New extra-point distance profoundly more impactful than expected

Extending the extra point from 20 to 33 yards might not have seemed like a staggering rule change at the start of the 2015 NFL season, but it arguably made all the difference at Mile High Stadium on Sunday.

By now you know the story. After Stephen Gostkowski missed an extra point in the 1st quarter of the AFC Championship, the Patriots were forced to attempt a 2-point conversion in the final moments of play to compensate for that miss and tie the score at 20. Much to the delight of the Denver faithful, the Patriots failed to convert.

Though Gostkowski's miss might seem like a absolute anomaly, especially considering the Patriots kicker had converted on his previous

The new kicking rule had a statistically significant effect on the game this season as teams connected on only 94.15 percent of extra points this year versus 99.4 percent one year prior.

In 2014, 26 teams made all of their extra point tries, while in the 2015 regular season, there were only 5 teams who were perfect, one of them being the Patriots Stephen Gostkowski, until yesterday of course.

The Steelers led the league with 11 two-point conversion tries, scoring on 8 of them, but the league average was just under 50%. Nevertheless, with the new rules, most statisticians would probably tell you that going for two is the right call 100% of the time.