The Patriots may not have been sounding alarms after a 1-2 start, but Mike Vrabel wasn’t interested in sugarcoating anything after last week’s blowout loss to the Jaguars. He said his concern level was “very high.”
One week later, New England walked out of Buffalo with a 29-26 road win over the Bills, and the mood around the team looks very different. A late touchdown from Efton Chism III delivered the game-winner and gave the Patriots a result that could matter far beyond one Sunday in October.
Vrabel said after the victory that the win “gets us back in the division race,” and that was no exaggeration. Had New England lost, it would have fallen three games behind Buffalo in the AFC East. Instead, the Patriots flipped the script and made this division race feel alive again.
There’s also a familiar feel to it. Last season, the Patriots opened 1-2 before ripping off a 13-1 run in the regular season. Asking this group to match that kind of surge feels like a stretch, especially with the schedule ahead, but the pattern is hard to miss: New England went to Buffalo as an underdog on Oct. 5 last year and came away with a three-point win that signaled a real step forward in Drake Maye’s second season.
Sunday carried a similar message. The Patriots didn’t need to convince the rest of the league they belonged, but they may have needed to prove it to themselves.
Maye went toe-to-toe with Allen, as Vrabel put it, and New England did it without two critical pieces in A.J. Brown and Christian Gonzalez.
That’s what made the win feel bigger than the scoreboard. Last year’s victory over the Bills sparked a run that didn’t end until a Dec. 14 meeting with Buffalo, ironically enough. This season may not line up for anything quite that dramatic, but there’s a clear opening for New England to build something.
The next stretch will tell the story. The Patriots host the Raiders on Oct. 11, then get the Jets on Oct. 18 before heading to Chicago to face the Bears on Oct.
- After that comes a trip to Miami on Nov. 1, a home game against the Packers on Nov. 8, and then the Lions in London on Nov.
The Raiders are still hard to read after their 3-0 start, but the Jets and Dolphins look like opponents New England can handle. The tougher tests may come from the NFC North, where the Bears are a tricky road assignment, the Lions bring a dangerous offense to London, and the Packers have looked more vulnerable than expected so far.
For now, though, the Patriots have the kind of win that can change a season’s temperature fast.
In Other News...
Bills Let Another AFC East Game Slip Away For One Reason
The Bills had enough offense to stay in the fight with New England, but it still came down to a familiar kind of AFC East frustration. James Cook and Josh Allen both helped Buffalo move the ball and put points on the board, yet the back-and-forth game never quite tilted the Bills way as the Patriots kept finding answers.
Drake Mayes night mixed big throws with turnovers, but New England still came up with the plays that mattered most, including touchdowns from Romeo Doubs and Efton Chism III. Chisms late scoring catch helped seal the Patriots 29-26 win, leaving Buffalo with another divisional loss and another reminder that close games in this rivalry keep slipping out of reach. [Read more 🡒]
Bills Loss To Patriots Turns On One Infuriating Sequence
A jarring sideline exchange helped flip the flow of a tight game in New England, and the Bills were the ones who benefited in the moment. Mike Vrabel was hit with a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty after using profanity toward an official, and the flag extended a Buffalo drive that ended with a game-tying touchdown before halftime.
From there, though, the Patriots regrouped and finished with a 29-26 win, powered by Drake Mayes three-touchdown afternoon and a game ball from Vrabel. The penalty became one of the afternoons most talked-about sequences, and both Vrabel and official Bill Vinovich addressed it after the game, leaving Buffalo with plenty to wonder about on a day when a small flashpoint carried outsized weight. [Read more 🡒]
Bills Secondary Concerns Just Got Harder To Ignore After Patriots Loss
The Bills secondary left little room for comfort in the loss to New England, and Maxwell Hairston had a difficult afternoon trying to keep pace with Romeo Doubs. Hairston was beaten for two touchdown catches, a reminder of how quickly coverage issues can swing a game when Buffalo is already dealing with injuries and a thin defensive backfield.
Josh Allens late interception only added to the frustration, even with Keon Coleman giving the offense a bright spot by finishing with 116 receiving yards and a touchdown. The bigger concern for Buffalo is that the defensive questions did not just linger after the defeat, they showed up in moments that mattered most, and now they sit there for everyone to see. [Read more 🡒]