One week after the New England Patriots took care of business on Thursday Night Football, the Buffalo Bills failed to do the same. The team of head coach Sean McDermott suffered a 23-19 defeat at the hands of the Houston Texans, dropping to 7-4 on the season.
For New England, this is welcome news. The Bills are their only true competition for the AFC East title this year, and they now find themselves two full games behind a 9-2 Patriots team that also holds the head-to-head tiebreaker between the two division
rivals.
As a result, the Patriots are now given a 90% chance to end up as AFC East champions. It would be the organization’s first division crown since the 2019 season, and break a Bills’ streak of five straight titles.
Obviously, though, a lot of football is left to be played before the Patriots can reclaim the spot atop the AFC East. Their remaining schedule may be relatively easy on paper, but it still features some challenges — starting this Sunday with a Cincinnati Bengals team that might get franchise quarterback Joe Burrow back from his two-month injury absence.
The Patriots will also still face a resurgent Baltimore Ravens squad and, in Week 15, host the Bills at Gillette Stadium. That game — which seems like a candidate to be flexed out of its 1 p.m. ET slot — could very well prove to be the difference, and a potential passing of the torch between the two clubs.
For now, however, the Patriots gained some extra wiggle room and are one step closer to finally winning the AFC East again and making true on one of head coach Mike Vrabel’s goals.
“Our goals will be to win the AFC East, to host home playoff games, and to compete for championships,” he said during his introductory press conference back in January. “That’s what it’s going to take. And what the timeline is, just like we say with injuries, we’re not going to put a timeline on an injury and we’re certainly not going to put a timeline on what those will be. But that’s going to be the expectations.”
