Ultimately, Josh Allen’s gutty effort produced a 27-24 victory, advancing Buffalo to the divisional round of the postseason for the sixth straight season.
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Say this for Josh Allen: He’s one tough son of a gun.
During the Buffalo Bills' AFC wild card playoff game against the Jacksonville Jaguars at EverBank Stadium, Allen made two trips to the sideline medical tent. Both times, the Bills' superstar quarterback emerged from the tent, took his spot on the end of the Bills’ bench and began reviewing game tape with quarterbacks coach Ronald Curry and backup Mitchell Trubisky.
Ultimately, Allen’s gutty effort produced a 27-24 victory, advancing Buffalo to the divisional round of the postseason for the sixth straight year.
“You're going to have to kill him to take him off the field,” Bills center Connor McGovern said in a jubilant visitors’ locker room after the game. “We all take the same approach up front. If he's out there, we're out there. He believes the same thing. We knew he would be fine and he would play through anything, because that's just who he is.”
Allen first was evaluated for a concussion after he took a shot to the head at the end of a quarterback draw with 3:07 left in the first quarter, sandwiched between Jaguars defenders Travon Walker and Josh Hines-Allen. His next trip to the injury tent came after his 2-yard touchdown run in the second quarter. Allen grabbed at his left knee just as he got to the goal line, and he was slow to get up after the play. McGovern briefly helped Allen to the sideline.
The Jaguars might have knocked him down. But they certainly didn’t knock him out.
“It trickles down from him, the team's toughness,” coach Sean McDermott said. “When your quarterback's that type of warrior, that type of competitor … it just goes through the whole team. We've got to get him as healthy as we can, though, for next week, and it's not something we take lightly.”
Allen finished 28 of 35 for 273 yards passing and three total touchdowns. He put the Bills up, 27-24, with a 1-yard touchdown run that came with 1:04 remaining in regulation time. It was the second straight scoring drive Allen led in the fourth quarter, following a 15-yard touchdown pass to tight end Dalton Kincaid that came with 8:56 left and had put the Bills up, 20-17.
“To have the wherewithal again to not blink, that's the mantra we've adopted this year,” Allen said. “If we've got time left and we've got the ball, we've got a shot, and you saw that there today.
“We feel like we've been in situations like this, and now every game presents itself in a different way. But to understand the moment, to not ride the wave, that was stuff that we've learned throughout the entire season. We were able to utilize that and use it today.”
Allen downplayed his injuries after the game, calling the second trip to the medical tent precautionary after he dinged his knee.
“Just got rolled up a little bit. Sometimes those get a little funky when you've got a lot of big dudes at your feet," he said. "Yeah, but we're good."
The Jaguars sacked Allen once and hit him three times, although some of the punishment he endured came at the end of designed runs. No matter what, Allen was left standing at the end.
“He's a winner. You could feel that he wasn't ready to go home today,” right guard O’Cyrus Torrence said of Allen. “None of us were, either. He led the charge with that, and you could just feel it. When your quarterback's not ready to give up, none of us are ready to give up.”
1. Jordan Poyer left the game
The veteran safety, who had missed the past two games with a hamstring injury, was reinjured in the first half and unable to continue playing after halftime. That forced rookie Jordan Hancock into the lineup, and it did not go well at times. Jacksonville went ahead, 24-20, with 4:03 left in the fourth quarter on running back Travis Etienne’s 14-yard touchdown reception. On the play, Hancock had an angle on Etienne in the open field but missed the tackle.
“I feel like I should have made the tackle. You know, he scored. We don't want that at all. But you live and you learn, and I'll learn from that,” Hancock said.
The rookie fifth-round draft pick won a national title last year at Ohio State, so he’s not stranger to the big stage. Nevertheless, his first NFL playoff game should be a valuable learning experience – especially if Poyer is forced to miss the divisional round with his injury.
“It's definitely a cool experience and I'm thankful for the opportunity,” Hancock said.
2. The Jaguars’ run defense stood tall
Jacksonville led the NFL in fewest yards allowed per game in the regular season (85.6), and the Jaguars proved they were just that tough. James Cook, Buffalo’s dynamic running back who led the league with 1,621 yards, was limited to just 46 yards on 15 carries – an average of 3.1 yards per attempt.
“We tried to continue to do it, and that's a really good defense – a good run defense especially,” Allen said. “We know that moving forward, we're going to need to rely on James. Sometimes it's the product of who you play. Again, we just found a way to win.”
In picking up the slack through the air Allen completed passes to nine receivers. He was the only other Bills player to log a carry, doing so 11 times for 33 yards.
“You've got to be a two-dimensional offense,” McDermott said. “You guys know we talk about that quite a bit. We've got to be able to pivot if the run game isn't working. I thought Joe (Brady, the offensive coordinator) did a really good job in that regard at times. … We made the plays we needed to make when we needed to make them, and that's really the story behind it.”
3. Matt Prater made good in his return
The Bills did not call up kicker Matthew Wright from the practice squad Saturday, meaning they had confidence in Prater being able to kick against the Jaguars despite his lingering quadriceps injury. Prater only handled field goals and extra points. Punter Mitch Wishnowsky handled kickoff duties for the Bills, which had an impact in the game, because two of them went into the end zone for touchbacks, giving the Jaguars the ball at their 35-yard line.
Prater, however, showed he was good to go in his main duties, successfully making a 50-yard field goal in the first quarter and adding a 47-yarder in the third quarter. Prater also made three extra points.
“When I kicked Thursday, I felt pretty good. It went really well. Then it was basically up to the staff to decide if they wanted me to go, but I didn't have any issues today. I felt good,” he said. “The offense moved the ball, set up a couple opportunities and I was happy the whole game. It was one of the most exciting games I've ever been a part of.”
4. Ray Davis coughed it up
Bills kick returner Ray Davis – who'd just been named to the All-Pro first team –made a bad mistake in the second quarter when he fumbled at the end of a 34-yard return. To make matters worse, Davis was injured on the play. He did return, but his injury briefly left the Bills with just Cook and Frank Gore Jr. at tailback. Third-down back Ty Johnson was inactive because of ankle injury suffered the week before, leading to Gore's call-up from the practice squad Saturday.
It was the Bills' only giveaway of the day. They won the turnover battle, 2-1, thanks to a pair of interceptions by the defense.
The Bills’ defense held after Davis’ giveaway, as linebacker Shaq Thompson stopped Lawrence a yard short on a fourth-and-2 carry. Officials initially gave Lawrence the first down, but McDermott successfully challenged the spot.
“It was a great job by the guys up top and then the magnitude of the play. It was close, we felt like,” McDermott said of the decision to challenge the play. “I felt like it was worth the challenge at that point from a fourth-down situation.”
5. Ball don’t lie!
A strange sequence happened at the end of the first half as Lawrence completed a 34-yard pass to Parker Washington, moving the ball to the Bills’ 41-yard line in the dying seconds of the second quarter. Without any timeouts, the Jaguars rushed to the line of scrimmage in an effort to snap the ball and spike it, allowing kicker Cam Little – who has a huge leg – to attempt a 59-yard field goal. The ball appeared to still be in the hands of Jagauars center Robert Hainsey as the clock hit :00, but a flag came in.
After a long huddle, officials penalized Bills defensive end Joey Bosa for being offside. Bosa didn’t make it back to the line of scrimmage, but the half appeared to be over.
After the 5-yard penalty, Little was able to attempt a 54-yard field goal because the clock stopped with 1 second remaining based on the penalty. Little, however, missed the kick wide left.
McDermott said he did not receive an explanation from the officials, aside from the obvious: They felt the clock had not expired, and that Bosa was offside.
