Moore allowed Jacoby Jones’ 70-yard touchdown catch in the final minute of regulation in the Broncos’ playoff game the Baltimore Ravens won in double overtime on their way to winning the Super Bowl.

John Elway, the Broncos’ vice president of football operations, and coach John Fox both say Moore made great progress last season and they have confidence he’ll put the blunder behind him and make even greater strides in 2013.

With free agency looming and the draft approaching, the Broncos say they feel good about their safeties, including Quinton Carter, who is recovering from knee surgery and could push Moore for playing time in training camp.

“We anticipate both of them to come back even better,” Fox said at the NFL combine last week.

Elway said Thursday on 104.3 FM The Fan radio station in Denver that there’s no thought at team headquarters of moving Pro Bowl cornerback Champ Bailey to safety next season, either.

As the AFC’s top seed, owners of an NFL-best 11-game winning streak and odds-on favorite to win it all, the Broncos thought they’d be the ones hoisting the Lombardi Trophy in New Orleans. Instead, the Ravens parlayed their stunning comeback in Denver into winning the rings that Peyton Manning and Von Miller were so confident they’d be getting fitted for about now.

The business of 2013 beckons, however, and the Broncos are moving on.

While fans may salivate over the likes of free agents Ed Reed and Charles Woodson or any number of younger safeties about to hit the open market, the Broncos’ brass continues to praise Moore for the progress he made last season and insist his wasn’t the only costly mistake that hurt them in the playoffs.

“Rahim had a great year,” Elway said at the NFL combine. “The strides he made from his rookie year to this year were tremendous. We expect him to make those same strides and I think the bottom line is for him — I haven’t seen him since the last game, but once he gets back and around his teammates — there are a lot of things in that game that caused it to end up the way it ended up. It wasn’t one play that caused us to lose.

“I’m happy with him and I think I was really impressed with him and how he handled it after the game. He stood up and he took it, which to me showed a great amount of maturation on his part. I’m looking forward to him coming back and even having a better year next year.”

Fox took just as much heat as Moore did over what happened next — ordering Manning to take a knee so Denver could take its chances in overtime rather than trying to move into field goal range with three timeouts and 31 seconds to work with.

“Once the season is over or after the Super Bowl, I think the reality is that everybody is 0-0, or undefeated or however you want to put it,” Fox said. “Any loss kind of sticks with you — scars, I might say — but you have to spit it out and get onto the next season and not let it linger and affect your preparation moving to the next season.”

Elway has been down this road before, and he’s optimistic a similar payoff awaits. The Hall of Fame quarterback-turned-front office executive has now been a part of two playoff runs that ended with questions about what went wrong in an early exit from the playoffs.

Elway experienced it as a player in 1996, when the Broncos were upset at home by the Jacksonville Jaguars, 30-27, but then came back and won the next two Super Bowls.

He once again finds himself picking up the pieces after a disheartening loss.

The Broncos’ stars all stumbled in that 38-35 loss: Manning had three turnovers, including an interception that led to the winning field goal; Bailey got burned repeatedly; Ryan Clady was playing with a torn rotator cuff that would require surgery and wasn’t anything close to his usual dominant self as Manning’s blindside protector; and Miller and Elvis Dumervil combined for just one sack.

All those poor performances were overshadowed, however, by the many mystifying mistakes that Moore, their second-year free safety, made on Jones’ 70-yard touchdown catch from Joe Flacco with 31 seconds left in the fourth quarter.

Moore lined up too shallow and allowed Jones to blow past him after leaving cornerback Tony Carter, who failed to jam at the line of scrimmage, in the dust. Then, instead of going for the tackle, Moore tried for the interception on Flacco’s 50-yard high-arcing heave but mistimed his jump.

Moore took the blame after the game and promised to make good, saying, “I’m going to keep my head high and next time the opportunity comes, I’m just going to make it for my team. I’ll just make the play.”

The Broncos say they’re willing to give him that chance.

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McCoy had one thing to do, though, before accepting the Chargers’ offer, so it was a good thing Chargers president Dean Spanos’ private plane was at his disposal.

“There was no doubt in my mind when I got back on that plane to go back home,” said McCoy, the former Denver Broncos offensive coordinator who was introduced Tuesday as Chargers’ new coach. “They wanted to keep me here last night. But I said, ‘I’ve got to talk to my wife about this before.’ If I made the decision without talking to my wife, I might get in a little trouble.”

So McCoy flew back to Denver to talk it over with his wife, Kellie. McCoy, his wife and their two children were back on the same plane Tuesday morning, flying back to San Diego to take the job.

“Without a doubt, we knew this was the place we wanted to be,” said McCoy, who signed a four-year contract.

McCoy replaces Norv Turner, who was fired along with general manager A.J. Smith after the Chargers finished 7-9 and missed the playoffs for the third straight season.

The move comes three days after the top-seeded Broncos were eliminated from the playoffs in a double-overtime home loss to the Baltimore Ravens.

The 40-year-old McCoy is the same age as Tom Telesco, who was hired as general manager last week. He interviewed after the Chargers already had talked to Seattle defensive coordinator Gus Bradley, fired head coaches Lovie Smith and Ken Whisenhunt, and Bengals offensive coordinator Jay Gruden.

“Once he came in and once we saw how good he was, we just felt we had to have him now,” Telesco said of McCoy. “We had to get it done or we’d lose him.”

“He was polished, prepared, had great questions, which I think is big, too, that he had a lot of questions for us. It’s a partnership between the GM and the head coach, through and through. We spend more time with each other during the season than we do with our own family, so it’s got to be a tight relationship. When he came in, after a little bit of time, you could tell he was the right guy for us. We went after him hard.”

San Diego was scheduled to interview Indianapolis offensive coordinator Bruce Arians on Wednesday. Telesco, previously the Colts’ vice president of football operations, called Arians on Tuesday morning and told him the Chargers had hired McCoy.

“It was a tough phone call,” Telesco said. “I have so much respect for Bruce. He’s an excellent football coach. He’s going to be a great head coach in this league. I was honest with him. I said, ‘There’s different situations, different fits, and right now, this is a fit for Mike McCoy.’ He understood.”

McCoy inherits a team that hasn’t won a playoff game since after the 2008 season.

He thanked all the coaches and players he’s worked with over the years for helping him get to this point. He also said he knew just a few minutes into his interview that San Diego was the right place.

“They all laughed at me when I walked in yesterday with this big ol’ bag with all these books and binders and everything,” McCoy said. “Well, that’s my life’s work. We’ve got a detailed plan that Tom and I are going to put together. … There’s going to be some change. There’s a reason for change. And change is good sometimes in organizations. We’ve just got to make the most of the opportunity we have moving forward.”

The Broncos have won consecutive AFC West titles. McCoy tutored quarterbacks Kyle Orton and Tim Tebow in 2011, and had Peyton Manning behind center in 2012.

McCoy, who interviewed with the Miami Dolphins last year after retooling Denver’s offense to the read-option for Tebow at midstream in 2011, burnished his head coaching credentials this season while blending the power formations the Broncos used in leading the league in rushing last year with Tebow and some of the spread formations that Manning ran in Indianapolis.

“I think he’s going to be a great head coach. Very detail-oriented, knows the game, relates with players very well,” Broncos wide receiver Brandon Stokley said.

“Peyton does a lot but Mike is very good at what he does and he did a great job this year, so a lot of credit needs to go to him, also,” Stokley said. “I think that’s what you need to be a head coach — you need to be flexible. You need to do whatever you think is the best for your team to win and you know that’s what he’s done. You saw that last year. Not a lot of offensive coordinators in the NFL like running that kind of offense, but that’s what he did and it was successful.”

McCoy said he was “a bit stubborn” after Tebow was made the starter in 2011, but then realized he needed to change the offense.

“You take advantage of what your players do best,” McCoy said.

With the Chargers, McCoy will work with Philip Rivers, who struggled this season in large part because he was under siege behind a shaky offensive line. Rivers was sacked 49 times and committed 22 turnovers, giving him 47 turnovers in two seasons.

“You go through the disappointment from the season and losing your coach to now having a new GM, new coach, and you get excited and ready to go for this 2013 season,” Rivers said.

“Once I found out that we were bringing him in on Monday, I was hoping he wasn’t going to leave again. I’m excited that was the case and I’m looking forward to getting started.”

Denver swept the Chargers in 2012, including an epic 35-24 victory at San Diego on Oct. 15 when Manning calmly led the Broncos back from a 24-0 halftime deficit.

McCoy was a walk-on quarterback at Long Beach State under coach George Allen. After the 49ers dropped football, he transferred to Utah. He signed with the Broncos as a free agent and spent his rookie season on Green Bay’s practice squad. He had stops in NFL Europe and with San Francisco, Philadelphia and in the CFL. He began his pro coaching career with Carolina before moving to the Broncos in 2009.

McCoy said he learned about detail and preparation from Allen, who coached the Los Angeles Rams and Washington Redskins.

“He was not a big yeller and screamer, he just expected you to go out there and do your job and execute the system the way it was supposed to be executed,” McCoy said.

McCoy said he planned to hire an offensive coordinator to call plays. Turner called his own plays. McCoy was non-committal about defensive coordinator John Pagano, saying he planned to evaluate the entire staff.

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Brady got his 17th, the most for any quarterback, in New England’s 41-28 AFC divisional victory over Houston on Sunday. If Brady can lead the Patriots past Baltimore in next weekend’s conference title game, then win the Super Bowl, he’ll equal the 49ers’ Hall of Famer for NFL championships.

Brady has guided the Patriots to five Super Bowls, winning the first three; Montana was 4 for 4 in the big game, playing for Brady’s hometown team.

“I grew up a 49ers fans,” Brady said. “Joe Montana and Steve Young … those guys are in another class.”

Next up is Baltimore, which stunned top-seeded Denver in double-overtime Saturday, and lost 23-20 at Gillette Stadium last January in the last step before the Super Bowl. But the Ravens beat the Patriots in Week 3 this season at Baltimore.

“I think the two best teams are in the final,” Brady said. “Baltimore certainly deserves to be here and so do we.”

Seldom-used Shane Vereen scored three times, twice on pinpoint throws from Brady, as New England (13-4) beat Houston (13-5) for the second time in a month.

Brady was missing some key helpers, but got the usual outstanding performance from Wes Welker, his favorite target the last six years. The AFC’s top receiver with 118 catches this season, Welker looked like he might reach that total against Houston’s befuddled defense. He caught six in the first half for 120 yards, including a 47-yarder, and wound up with eight for 131.

And the AFC East champion Patriots got more than anyone could have predicted from third-string running back Vereen, who scored their first two TDs on a 1-yard run and an 8-yard pass. He capped his biggest pro performance with an over-the-shoulder 33-yard catch early in the fourth period.

Vereen became the third player in postseason history to have two receiving touchdowns and one rushing score in the same game, according to Elias Sports Bureau. Vereen joins Roger Craig (1984, San Francisco 49ers) and Ricky Watters (1994, 49ers), both of whom did it in the Super Bowl.

The throw to Vereen was Brady’s 41st postseason TD pass, behind only Brett Favre (44) and, you guessed it, Montana (45).

“I hope I am around for a few more years,” the 35-year-old Brady said. “I love playing, I love competing …”

That boost from Vereen offset the loss of tight end Rob Gronkowski (arm) and RB Danny Woodhead (thumb) in the first quarter.

Sources told ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter that Gronkowski broke his arm again Sunday and will miss the remainder of the playoffs. Pro Football Talk earlier reported that the tight end will need season-ending surgery.

New England’s defense helped put away the Texans. Rob Ninkovich’s leaping third-quarter interception stopped a drive, and six plays later, Brady hit Brandon Lloyd for a 6-yard score.

Although the Texans got two fourth-quarter TDs on passes by Matt Schaub, their season ended with four defeats in their last six games. That slump cost the AFC South champions the top seed in the playoffs, forcing a trip to New England after they beat Cincinnati in the wild-card round.

The Texans couldn’t measure up.

Unlike their 42-14 loss here a month ago, the Texans didn’t fold early. J.J. Watt, their dominating defensive end, bothered Brady, and when they fell behind 17-3, they had the fortitude to climb back.

Arian Foster did all the work after Danieal Manning’s second big kickoff return, this one a 35-yarder that had 15 yards tacked on when kicker Stephen Gostkowski brought down Manning with a horse-collar tackle. The Pro Bowl runner covered all 47 yards on a five-play drive and his 1-yard run — he barely squeezed into the end zone — made it 17-10.

Houston forced a three-and-out, and a short punt gave the Texans another shot just before halftime. They got close enough for Shayne Graham to kick a 55-yard field goal as the half ended.

But the Patriots pulled away in the third quarter for coach Bill Belichick’s 17th postseason win, third behind Tom Landry (20) and Don Shula (19).

Needing a quick jolt after being blown out by the Patriots on Dec. 10, the Texans got it on the opening kickoff from Manning. He took the ball 6 yards in his end zone and never hesitated in returning it. He broke free at the Houston 30 and wasn’t run down until reaching the New England 12.

That spark didn’t even last one play, though, and Houston wound up with Graham’s 27-yard field goal 63 seconds in.

And when the Texans closed the first half with a 10-point spurt, they wasted the momentum by allowing a quick touchdown drive to open the third period. Brady went to the familiar (Welker and tight end Aaron Hernandez) on that series before second-year back Stevan Ridley scored on an 8-yard burst.

New England lost Gronkowski and Woodhead almost immediately. Gronkowski missed five regular-season games with a broken left forearm, but returned for the finale. Eight Patriots plays on offense and he was gone again.

So Brady found other targets; he probably could complete passes to Belichick for big gains.

Vereen was an unlikely star. After gaining 400 yards overall during the season, he picked up 124 against the Texans. He had four touchdowns in the regular season.

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