As New England football fans pack away their Patriots gear this week, the outcome of Sunday’s Super Bowl left one Westbrook resident with a different task – purchasing a new license plate.

Six weeks ago, Howard Spear of Graham Road ordered a vanity plate that read “PATS 19-0” thinking it would be Monday’s most sought after item. When his favorite team was upset by the New York Giants, leaving New England with a record of 18-1, Spear was left driving illegally.

“Now I’m claiming that I’m really a Giants fan, and I bought it to jinx the Pats,” Spear, 57, said Monday.

Spear got the idea for buying the plate when he saw a similar Massachusetts plate being auctioned off on the Internet for $9,000. Spear purchased his for $15 – the standard vanity plate fee. Now, he said, it will hang in his office.

Before the sting of Sunday’s upset wore off, Spear lent one of the plates to his brother-in-law John Corbin, a Giants fan. Corbin, also of Westbrook, took the plate to work at Portland City Hall Tuesday to razz the Patriots fans in his office.

“I kind of gloated a little bit,” said Corbin, who brought the plate around to different departments where he knew a lot of Patriots fans worked. “It was fun.”

Though Corbin speculated Spear was taking the loss harder than he let on, he said his brother-in-law was a “good sport” about lending him the license plate.

Like many Mainers, Spear used to be a Giants fan himself.

“If someone’s going to beat them, it wasn’t so bad for it to be the Giants,” said Spear, though he was “very disappointed” with the outcome.

Spear said he did lose some sleep Sunday night, but each day, the loss is being pushed further away from the forefront of his mind.

“What are you going to do?” he said. “It’s only a game.”

Howard Spear of Westbrook holds the license plate he purchased a bit prematurely. Monday, after the New York Giants defeated the New England Patriots in the Superbowl, Spear got a new license plate.