The Buffalo Bills finished the day on Sunday with a 23-20 lead that gave them a victory over the Baltimore Ravens.
While the final score might suggest the game was close, it wasn’t for very long.
In fact, Buffalo was down early in the game as Baltimore leapt to a 20-3 lead before QB Josh Allen and the Bills offense scored 17 points to take that lead and win the game in the final seconds on a Tyler Bass field goal.
Those points would go unanswered thanks to another shutdown effort by the Bills defense that included an interception by Jordan Poyer in the final minutes of the fourth quarter.
No moment was too big, the Bills (3-1) kept their poise and played their way back into the contest.
“It’s situational football. It’s what coach McDermott preaches to us,” Allen said while speaking with the media after the game. “Defense leads to offense and offense puts us in positions to win games, a couple of huge kicks by Tyler Bass. Those are games that you love winning. It’s just a hard-fought battle both ways. Winning on the last play of the game is always fun and just proud of our guys for how they played.”
Despite their defense giving up 20 points early and the offense committing an interception and a fumble, those turnovers did not deter the team.
“I’ll tell you what, it would be very difficult if we didn’t have the guys in the locker room that we did,” Allen added. “Guys that just love each other, want to play for each other, aren’t going to stress in frantic situations.”
The QB executed effectively in managing the final 1:50 minutes of the game, which put the Bills in field goal range. It was an awareness by the QB of the time left on the clock that led to his instructing RB Devin Singletary in the huddle to make sure to go down and not score a TD on that last play by his offensive unit. Scoring a TD would have left time on the clock for the Ravens to return a kickoff and possibly have an offensive possession.
“He’s such a competitor to get us even into that situation to begin with,” McDermott said of Allen prior to leaving the stadium. “He loves to compete. And then what I saw today, in particular, Albert, was just he was so calm. He knew exactly what he wanted to do with the ball, and then he knew exactly what the situation was as we got closer to the goal line.”
Allen’s playmaking is not lost on his teammates either.
“We don’t take that for granted,” center Mitch Morse shared. “The offense goes the way he goes. That’s a lot of pressure to have on one pair of shoulders, and he carries it with grace. He always executes when we need him the most.”
The all-around win also demonstrated ways the Bills have improved across all three phases of football this season.
“It’s a combination of the defense doing their job, the offense, and even special teams,” TE Dawson Knox pointed out. “You want to treat each play like it has a life of its own, not harping on the past, not looking too far ahead. You want to dominate one play at a time and start to crawl back. The defense pitched a shutout in the second half. When they do that, it’s fun to be out there on offense.”
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