Going into the season, all eyes were on Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills offense, but after the first four games, it’s the defense that is turning heads.
After knocking off the Houston Texans 40-0 on Sunday, the Bills earned their second shutout in only four games and have given up a total of only 44-points on the season. They also took the ball away from the Texans five times, with four interceptions and a forced fumble.
For a defense that was often times labeled the weak link during Buffalo’s AFC Championship game run last season, things have turned around quickly.
“Since I started playing tackle football back in 7th grade, you always take pride in the goose eggs,” safety Micah Hyde, told the media following the game. “You for sure do. It’s hard to do. You gotta cherish those. But at the end of the day, next weeks another week and we’re gonna forget all about this goose egg.”
When asked why things seem to be clicking for this year’s defense, Hyde spoke about the chemistry this group has developed throughout their time together.
“We’ve been around each other for a long time. Some of us five years, some of us four,” Hyde said. “We’re all brothers out there. We like to hang out. We enjoy each others company, whether that’s in the complex or away. We just enjoy each other. And I think it starts with love of this football team. That may sound a little cheesy, but we all love each other, man and we want to see each other succeed. And I think when you have a team like that and especially a defense like that, you know we’re gonna go out there and play for each other.”
While it might sound a little silly to criticize an offense that has put up 35, 43 and 40 points over their last three games, the defense is allowing the offense space to find its footing.
“It gives us a lot of confidence for sure that we can go out there and not try to force plays down the field,” Allen said after the game. “We wanna be us and that’s continue to move the chains on third down and try to skip third down most importantly, but if we don’t, at least we’re trying to end every drive in a kick.”
Knowing that they don’t have to carry the team alone each week, is a big change from last season, which at times resulted in the offense bailing out bad defensive performances.
“I understand our defense is gonna have our back, but we gotta be there for them as well,” Allen continued. “They’re playing lights out right now, two shutouts in the last three weeks… that doesn’t really happen in the NFL too often. We appreciate those guys, they’re playing extremely well.”
While it’s easy to get excited about what this Bills team has shown the last three weeks following their opening loss to the Steelers, head coach Sean McDermott did his best to keep things in perspective.
“Always good to win,” McDermott told reporters after the game. “It was a great defensive performance and just an overall good team win.”
When pressed on how his defense will respond to most likely being ranked the top unit in the NFL following their second shutout of the season, McDermott, as he often is, was short and to the point.
“We got work to do,” McDermott said. “It’s week 4 and we’ve come out of the first quarter of the season, 3-1. It’s how you improve every week… rankings don’t matter.”
While 3-1 with your defense playing lights out football is a good place to be, the Bills face their toughest test of the season in week 5, when they travel to Kansas City to take on the Chiefs on Sunday Night Football.
While the Chiefs haven’t looked quite like the team we are use to seeing, the Bills will need their offense and special teams to play as well as their defense has, in order to come away with the victory.
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