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Alaina Getzenberg, ESPNNov 17, 2024, 11:18 PM ET
- Alaina Getzenberg is a staff writer who covers the Buffalo Bills and the NFL. She joined ESPN in 2021. Alaina was previously a beat reporter for the Charlotte Observer and has also worked for CBS Sports and the Dallas Morning News. She is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley. You can follow her via Twitter @agetzenberg.
ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — It was one of the Buffalo Bills‘ newest players who best summed up playing alongside quarterback Josh Allen and the enormity of his scoring play that ultimately sealed the team’s 31-20 win over the Kansas City Chiefs.
“The Josh Allen experience, with this magnitude, has been phenomenal, man,” wide receiver Amari Cooper said. “… He’s a great player. The old adage, big-time players make big-time plays in big-time situations, and that’s exactly what he did.”
The play was unlikely at best. On fourth-and-2 from the Chiefs’ 26-yard line in a two-point game with under three minutes remaining, the Bills’ offense remained on the field. Allen elected to keep the ball after stepping back and faking a pass to running back Ty Johnson, swerving and weaving past a variety of defenders into the end zone — somehow not being brought down time after time — for what ended up being the game-winning touchdown.
Allen made that choice in part because the play was actually not called for the defensive look the Chiefs ended up in.
“Really had a play for man [coverage],” Allen said. “Could have checked out of it, but they held a pretty good man look. They dropped out into zone again, [I was] just trying to create and keep the play alive. There was a crease and just trusted the feet.”
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After the score, the defense clinched the game on the following possession with an interception by middle linebacker Terrel Bernard. The Bills handed Kansas City its first loss of the season and improved to 9-2, the team’s best start since 1992. Since 2020, Allen and the Bills are 4-1 in the regular season against the Chiefs, and 0-3 in the postseason.
The rush was the second-longest touchdown scramble of Allen’s career, and per NFL Next Gen Stats, the play had a 1.2% of scoring when Allen tucked the ball to run.
His teammates saw it a little differently.
“As soon as I saw him get past the line of scrimmage, I kind of knew he was scoring,” tight end Dawson Knox said. “And even though there’s a linebacker, two DBs right in front of him, I’ve seen it a hundred times from him in the most important situations, he seems to do that all the time and it’s incredible to watch.”
“They brought four, I was in a 3-for-2 situation with [center] Connor [McGovern] and have an internal clock in your head where you start to look once everything’s kind of secure and when he took off it was like, holy s—,” left guard David Edwards said. “And that’s what makes him the best in the world. So, watching that was crazy. That’s why he’s the best.”
Cornerback Rasul Douglas has a rule that he stays seated when the offense is on the field in fourth-down situations, as if it has already converted. As the Allen play went on, however, he started elevating “like an airplane,” standing up by the end.
“When I see him running and I see him go, ‘hu hu,’ he got the ball out like Shady McCoy,” Douglas said. “I’m like ‘All right, tuck it a little bit,’ and then he scored. So, that’s Josh, man, he’s the best quarterback in the league right now.”
Josh Allen wowed his teammates again after sealing Sunday’s win with a 26-yard scramble for a game-winning touchdown. AP Photo/Jeffrey T. Barnes
The decision to go for it on fourth down was not a no-brainer. If the Bills did not pick up the yards, the Chiefs would have the ball back with plenty of time to go downfield and would have needed just a field goal to win. Going for it, however, was a decision the Bills felt strongly about.
“I just felt we mapped it out during the week and felt strongly that that was the right decision,” coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t want to be resulting, if you will, but would’ve stood by it if it didn’t work out. Just felt like there’s been too many games, as you guys know, where Andy [Reid] and Patrick [Mahomes] have come back and you kick a field goal and they go score a touchdown or it’s overtime just in different games where they’ve been and they get the ball first and the game’s so they’re just way too good to not go for it right there.”
Allen finished the game completing 27 of 40 passes for 262 yards, one passing touchdown and one interception. He led the team with 12 carries for 55 yards and the score. Per the Elias Sports Bureau, Allen is the first player in NFL history to throw a TD to 11 different players through 11 games in two different seasons (2020, 2024). This was also his 30th career game leading his team in both passing and rushing yards, fourth most in NFL history.
The Bills won the game despite being without three offensive starters in tight end Dalton Kincaid, wide receiver Keon Coleman and right tackle Spencer Brown. The offense still put up 30-plus points — the first team to do so in the regular season against the Chiefs since Week 4 in 2022 — for a fifth straight game (tied with 2021 for second-longest streak in franchise history).
“The league has stars and [Allen’s] one of them, you know what I mean,” Cooper said. “He’s just a tremendous talent, very skilled guy. Some guys are just made to play ball and the position that they play, and he’s definitely one of those guys. So, yeah, it’s been very fun to watch. I’ve been having a lot of joy since I’ve been here. We won every game, so it’s been cool.”
The win keeps the Bills in position to compete for the No. 1 seed in the AFC as Buffalo is now just a half game back of Kansas City with the team’s bye week next, and then six games to go.
There’s acknowledgment that while this was a significant game — as defensive end Von Miller said despite a speech McDermott gave the team saying otherwise, “This is a big game. This is why we here … when the bright lights come on, we rise to the occasion” — it’s also just Week 11. As Mahomes was overheard saying after the game to Allen, “We’ll do it again, baby.”
“Given our history, we tend to meet in the playoffs, so again, we’re not there yet,” Allen said after the game. “We’ll focus on that when we get there.”
