Christian Benford, Bills’ surging defense lift team’s ceiling sky-high
This game could be one Bills fans remember as a turning point.
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Buffalo Bills cornerback Christian Benford runs for a touchdown after an interception against the Cincinnati Bengals in the fourth quarter.
Mark Konezny / Imagn Images
Even by the Buffalo Bills’ lofty standards of crazy regular-season victories with Josh Allen, their 39-34 win on Sunday has a strong case to be near the top of the list.
As the Cincinnati Bengals raced out in the first half to a 21-11 lead, it appeared the Bills would need to be near perfect in the second half if they had any hope of victory.
It certainly started toward perfection. The Bills received the ball to begin the half and marched it down for a touchdown on nine plays to make it 21-18. Then their defense forced a rare stop of Joe Burrow and the Bengals’ offense after three plays, giving the Bills the ball back with a chance to take the lead.
Slowly but surely, Allen methodically helped bring the offense down to Cincinnati’s 2-yard line, and with running back James Cook about to plunge into the end zone, out popped the ball as the Bengals jumped on it, vanquishing the Bills’ best opportunity to take the lead and possibly win the game.
Burrow and the Bengals did their part from there, wasting tons of time and punching the ball in for a touchdown on a 12-play drive to bring their lead back up to 10 points.
A Bills loss seemed certain — especially with how their 2025 season has gone.
After all, it was a 14-point swing, and there the Bills sat, down 10 points to a Bengals offense they had stopped emphatically only once before, with only 8:44 to go. Allen, hell-bent against going quiet into the night, led a quick 1:11 touchdown drive to make it 28-25 to at least give them a chance.
However, no one was prepared for what happened next — especially from a Bills defense that had been gashed all game. Even on that drive, the Bengals had picked up two quick first downs with two plays that gained at least 15 yards.
Then, the potentially seminal moment of the Bills’ 2025 regular season took place. It was, without question, the most significant defensive moment of their season, and in the running for one of the NFL’s defensive plays of the year.
“I was on the other side of the field doing whatever my job was,” Bills nickel corner Taron Johnson recalled. “All I hear is the crowd. And then I said, I’m like, ‘What the f———, how did this happen?!’ I didn’t know how it happened.”
“Honestly, I didn’t even see it,” defensive end A.J. Epenesa said. “I just heard the roar of the crowd. I think I got to my O-lineman, kind of made my move, and then I heard the roar of the crowd, and I was kinda like, ‘What’s going on?!’ And then CB is running the other way.”
The Bills grabbed two quick interceptions off Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow late in the game.Sam Greene / Imagn Images
CB, better known as top Bills cornerback Christian Benford, was sent on a first-and-10 blitz, unblocked, and he had Burrow in his sights for a takedown. Rather than trying to scramble or take the sack, Burrow’s reaction was to loft the ball toward Ja’Marr Chase.
As the ball came off Burrow’s hand, Benford skied and picked off the pass. Then, in one fluid motion, he tucked the ball, broke a half-hearted tackle attempt from the quarterback, and off to the races he went.
“Man, he’s like a silent assassin,” linebacker Shaq Thompson said. “He don’t say much, but you know when it’s time to go, he’s going to be the one to make the play.”
Benford took the intercepted pass 63 yards into the end zone, and with it, the Bills took their first lead of the game, 32-28.
Many of his teammates were simply in awe of the feat.
“It’s fan mode for sure,” Allen said. “A lot of swear words. Hopefully they weren’t showing me on the sidelines because I said a lot of bad ones.”
“I couldn’t believe it. It honestly looked like a play that I don’t think I could remake in Madden,” rookie cornerback Maxwell Hairston said. “I was like, ‘Bro, like, you’re insane. For real, for real.'”
“We sent him on a corner blitz and Burrow was trying to throw it out there for Chase. And I was like, ‘Oh snap, I’m finna make this tackle,'” recalled rookie safety Jordan Hancock, who was in the game for injured starter Cole Bishop. “Next thing you know, he snaps it out the air and starts running. It was crazy.”
“Seeing that in real life was just kind of crazy,” Hairston added. “Like, I don’t think the video replay is gonna even do it no justice.”
Hancock said he didn’t know Benford could jump as high as he did for the interception, though that might just be a case of him having only one year with the Bills’ top cornerback. Others knew all about Benford’s athleticism.
“I remember when he was a rookie and I seen him jump, he just jumped for an interception and from my vantage point, I just thought his feet were like at eye level to me,” Epenesa said. And I was like, ‘Come on man, this guy’s gonna be good.'”
“I don’t know if he was (a hooper), but he damn sure could be,” Epenesa added. “Dude probably touched the top of the backboard with those hops.”
Benford is known around the building as one of the team’s hardest workers, routinely on the field well past practice, working on his technique du jour that he’s maniacally attempting to fine-tune. Some even call him “Mr. Detail-Oriented” for making the small elements of the game a priority. Last week, it was his scoop and score to change the game against the Steelers, with an interception to boot.
On top of his Bengals pick-six, Benford followed Chase — one of the league’s best wide receivers — all game. Chase did not have a single reception with Benford in direct coverage.
“I think Christian Benford is the best cornerback in the NFL,” Hairston declared, “and he’s shown that, especially these last two weeks.”
“That’s just CB making a play, you know, he’s CB1 for a reason, and that’s what he does,” defensive tackle Jordan Phillips said. “We’ve seen it two weeks in a row now. He’s in a groove, he’s in his flow state, and we’re all happy he is.”
Benford’s flow state immediately transferred to the Bills’ defense on their next play. Burrow again dropped back to pass, pushed the ball to his left, only for Phillips to bat the ball into the air, and it nestled perfectly into Epenesa’s breadbasket for a second takeaway in two plays.
Two interceptions in 16 seconds, and against Burrow of all quarterbacks, when he was flamethrowing his way up and down the field before it.
“Yeah. I’m sure he didn’t love it,” Epenesa said with a Grinch-like slow grin. “Turnovers, giving Josh the ball back, obviously that’s the name of the game, and that’ll always give us a chance to win.”
Allen and the offense, sensing the opportunity, worked their way into the end zone, giving them an 11-point lead with only three minutes left. The Bills accomplished their comeback mission, not allowing Cook’s lost fumble to deter them, answering with two pivotal plays when the defense didn’t have all of its best players or its best stuff.
“That’s this time of year, right? You’re looking for moments, guys doing their job,” head coach Sean McDermott said. “And when you do your job, good things happen, and that’s what we saw happen.”
McDermott knows better than most how late-season, in-game instances like this can permeate and propel a team toward the postseason. His Bills teams have done it often, now boasting a 19-3 record in December since the 2020 campaign.
Sometimes during a season, particularly when the calendar flips to December, a single moment can serve as a catalyst, unearthing something bigger for an NFL team.
The 2025 season has been anything but perfect for the Bills. In many ways, it’s been one of their most challenging on the field. And at the same time, it’s been one of the most difficult for fans, as the anxiety over Allen getting to and winning a Super Bowl during his prime has been felt more significantly than before.
However, even through the strife, with the offense and defense taking turns drawing the weekly ire, there sit the Bills with a 9-4 record, now with a 96 percent chance to make the playoffs, and still a hint of life to win the AFC East.
The Bills would likely need to go 3-1 at worst, and they would need the Patriots to unexpectedly lose a game to the Jets or Dolphins in the final two weeks, but the AFC East is at least on the table. Had they lost against the Bengals, as was looking likely for most of the game, the hope of winning yet another division crown would have been all but dead.
There is no ignoring the microscopic questions surrounding this 2025 Bills team. They are not a perfect team, by any stretch. But as the AFC continues to be flawed from one week to the next, with contenders suffering catastrophic injuries or unexpected losses along the way, it’s leaning toward one conclusion — and it’s one the Bills haven’t uttered since they were fresh on to the contender scene in 2020. Back then, their moniker was, “Why not us?”
Despite all of their hang-ups this season, all the evidence pushes toward one question. Why not the Bills in 2025?
It is worth wondering if, perhaps, the perfect team wasn’t the necessary component for reaching their professional pinnacle, but rather, the perfect situation. With only four games left to play, the Bills are the best of the AFC’s provens, with most everyone around them populating the yet-to-prove-its.
When the Bills get this version of Allen, as has been so commonplace in the playoffs throughout his career, combined with an opportunistic and slowly ascending defense, it automatically raises their ceiling to beat just about anyone. And that’s certainly the case with the “anyones” in this year’s potential AFC playoff field.
Unquestionably, something felt a bit different about this win compared with all the others on the 2025 schedule. The Bills effectively dealt a crushing blow to any playoff hopes the Bengals had and, at the same time, perhaps erased a potential postseason roadblock. It also served as the return of the “no-lead-is-safe” Bills, even with seemingly inevitable defeat staring them in the face.
Sometimes, it all goes back to one-fork-in-the-road juncture in a season. And for the Bills, Benford’s superhuman pick-six to steal a win, to pair with their superhero of a quarterback, could be the one many remember as that propelling moment to something greater.
The Bills will need to continue their march forward from here to prove it’s not just a one-off, but the ceiling around this team is beginning to lift from the midseason doldrums. Slowly but surely, both the offense and defense are pushing that ceiling further and further upward.
As is the case in the NFL in 2025, where the weirdness reigns supreme, anything is possible. And that anything includes the very lofty goal that seemed so distant two months ago.
Don’t rule out the Bills just yet.
