FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – As the Buffalo Bills were trudging off the Gillette Stadium field at halftime Sunday afternoon, they took notice of the behavior of their frontrunning opponents.
Oh, the New England Patriots – led by the ultra-vocal and demonstrative former Bills, Stefon Diggs and Mack Hollins – seemed to have forgotten that 30 minutes does not make a football game. Splashed across the huge Jumbotron, they were riling up the fans and seemingly taunting the Bills who certainly looked dead and buried as they trailed 24-7 at the break.
“When we were coming in from the halftime, we could hear all the guys from the Patriots yelling,” offensive tackle Spencer Brown said. “Oh, yeah, we knew that they played for us and Mack and I have a good relationship. He was actually lined up at one point in time and I was talking (crap) to him, and he was, like, giving it back. We’re very aware of who we got out there, and they know who we are, and they got to remember that tonight.”
Oh, they sure did.
New England had its first AFC East title since 2019 in its sights, but the Bills – who have won the division five years in a row – were not going to relinquish that crown without a fight and when the final gun sounded, Diggs and Hollins were eating crow and those championship hats and t-shirts that were delivered to New England this week remained in their boxes as the Bills pulled off a spectacular 35-31 victory.
“We understood what was at stake, but at the same time that wasn’t really in the back of our heads,” Josh Allen said. “We were just, ‘Hey, we’ve got to find a way to win a football game.’ And that’s what we did tonight. We stayed the course, stayed together, didn’t ride the highs, didn’t ride the lows.”
That in and of itself was commendable because this game had more highs and lows than the local weatherman.
For so many years – the first two decades of the 21st century to be exact – the Patriots were the team that almost always won games like this because they had that championship pedigree that Buffalo simply couldn’t match. Things changed once Tom Brady and then Bill Belichick departed, and now it’s the Bills who usually win games like this.
Sure, Buffalo’s chances of winning the division remain slim, but Sean McDermott’s team proved its mettle and proved that no matter what the standings currently say, they are still a team to be reckoned with.
“Great football team on the other side, great quarterback, great coaches, so you’ve got to kind of tip your hat to them,” Diggs conceded. “They had a great plan, and they came and played well. So, it’s going to be a 60-minute football game. We got off to a good start, and that’s not all. You’ve got to come out and have the same intensity in the second half. Obviously, we had a little lull. They’ve been together for some years now, and they’ve led this division for a while. So, in order to get over that hump, play 60-minute football and execute at a higher level.”
Here are some of my observations:
Bills overcame another slow start
I think it’s pretty obvious by now that the Bills are a second-half team. In their first 14 games they have been outscored by 29 points in the first half, but they have outscored their opponents by a whopping and league-best 116 in the second half. That’s crazy, and this game was a shining example of that discrepancy.
“That’s something we have to work on,” McDermott admitted. “We have to get into a rhythm sooner. But there’s also an ability to adjust during a game. Anybody can come up with a game plan, but it’s also what happens when they take certain things away. Are you able to pivot and adjust? I think that’s the sign of a great staff.”
In the first two quarters the Bills looked like playoff pretenders – they fell behind 24-7 as the Patriots rolled up 285 yards, 177 on the ground, and scored on four of their five possessions. But in the second half, New England scored just once on five possessions, gained a mere 100 yards (65 coming on one play, TreVeyon Henderson’s touchdown run), and had the ball for less than eight minutes because they made just three first downs.
On the flip side, the Bills scored TDs on their first four possessions in the second half, then after an unfortunate three-and-out midway through the fourth quarter, followed by a huge defensive stand, they got a second chance to kill the rest of the clock and they grinded out the first down they needed in the final two minutes. After gaining just 76 yards in the first half with five first downs, the Bills had 273 yards and made 17 first downs in the final two quarters.
“We came in here (to the locker room at the half) and there wasn’t a lot of conversation going on,” Brown said. “We just waited for the coaches to come in, and they kind of just said what we already knew. Take one play at a time, it doesn’t matter. Don’t even look at the scoreboard, which we didn’t, and just play the next one. That’s the motto right there.”
Does bad run defense even matter?
The Bills are making a strong case that getting bowled over by the opponents’ running game doesn’t really mean that much. Consider this: The Bills have yielded at least 185 yards rushing in six games this season (four of those were more than 200 including a season-high 246 by the Patriots) yet the Bills have won four of those games. The rest of the teams in the NFL when allowing at least 185 yards rushing are 4-26.
“We were giving up some runs, and because of that they were a two-dimensional offense, keeping us off balance a little there,” McDermott said. “Run defense starts with gap integrity. We’ll look at it and address it. We’ve got to be better, that’s for sure.”
The run defense was horrible in the first half as both Henderson (7.2 per carry and a 52-yard TD run) and Rhamondre Stevenson (8.3) were gashing Buffalo, while the Bills also lost track of QB Drake Maye twice and he ran in for a pair of scores as the Patriots built a 21-0 lead.
But after halftime, outside of Henderson’s 65-yard TD, the Patriots had only four other yards rushing. That TD was kind of lucky, too. It was a toss play to the right which the Bills sniffed out, but everyone kind of fell over each other and Henderson was able to reverse field and take advantage of terrible back side contain by AJ Epenesa and Max Hairston as he broke out and sprinted to the end zone.
“It was one play,” McDermott. “They had been playing really tough football in the second half, credit Bobby (Babich) and the defensive staff and the players for that. Good adjustments again, they were playing really well, but they made a play. The player’s a special player. He’s got speed for sure. We need to take better angles than we did on the back side of it. That’s where it bounced back on the cut-back.”
Ray Davis provided a huge spark
One of the most surprising developments of this season has been the emergence of Ray Davis as a dangerous kickoff returner. He had a 97-yard touchdown against the Texans and he came into the game leading the NFL with a 30.6 average per return, and that will only go up after he averaged 41 yards on four returns.
“Ray Davis, big time, couple big-time kickoff returns that helped set up field position for us and scoring opportunities,” McDermott said.
Perhaps the biggest one was his 58-yarder to open the second half. That was the impetus for Buffalo turning the game around as it gave Allen a drive start at the Patriots 44 and 3:31 later, when Allen hit Dawson Knox for a touchdown, the Bills were within 24-14.
“Coming out for the second half, it may have been Ray Davis’ return putting us in good field position, giving us confidence of, hey, let’s just go play football now,” Allen said when asked about a turning point.
Wide receivers once again non-productive
Khalil Shakir made a dazzling 37-yard catch on a risky fourth-and-3 throw by Allen in the fourth quarter, and that set up Allen’s go-ahead TD pass to Knox that made it 28-24 with 10:03 left to play.
Beyond that, Shakir finished with four other catches for 28 yards, and the rest of the wide receiver group was utterly useless. Joshua Palmer had the only other reception for 16 yards, while Brandin Cooks failed to catch any of his three targets and Keon Coleman and Tyrell Shavers were blanked.
Fortunately for Buffalo, its tight ends have been picking up the slack. Knox celebrated the birth of his daughter with two TDs, Dalton Kincaid caught three for 34 and Jackson Hawes had one for nine as Allen finished with a mundane 193 yards passing.
Before the game, Gabe Davis was made inactive with Palmer returning and McDermott said that was because of the game plan. Then again, does it really matter what the game plan is with this group?
“It’s important that you don’t just target one position group, one player,” McDermott said. “Josh did a great job. I thought Joe (Brady) called a great game, particularly in the second half. Josh was taking what the defense was giving him. That’s a sign of an offense that’s unselfish, that’s disciplined and is in a rhythm.”
It’s also a sign of an offense that has not one wide receiver who can make a play down the field.
Sal Maiorana has covered the Buffalo Bills for more than four decades including 36 years as the full-time beat writer/columnist for the D&C. He has written numerous books about the history of the team, and he is also co-host of the BLEAV in Bills podcast/YouTube show. He can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com, and you can follow him on X @salmaiorana and on Bluesky @salmaiorana.bsky.social.
This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: 4 things that stood out in Bills’ resurgent Week 15 win against Patriots
Reporting by Sal Maiorana, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle / Rochester Democrat and Chronicle
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