The Buffalo Bills and New York Jets meet Sunday for another round of their twice-a-year AFC East rivalry, and recent history has been pretty kind to Buffalo.
The Bills lead the all-time series 73-58, have won five straight against New York and own a 10-2 record against the Jets since 2020. Buffalo has also kept New York out of the end zone on its opening drive in each of their last 25 meetings. It’s been a while since the Jets have given Bills fans much reason to worry.
Of course, when two teams have
been playing each other twice a year for decades, there’s only so much history we can dig up before we start telling the same stories. And while we’re always happy to revisit a good Bills win, even our Time Capsule could use a change of scenery.
Head coach Aaron Glenn, defensive coordinator Brian Duker and offensive coordinator Frank Reich all have some history with Buffalo. They’ve faced Allen, coached against the Bills and, in Reich’s case, even worn a Buffalo uniform.
Glenn already has a season with the Jets under his belt, while Duker and Reich are getting their first taste of this rivalry from New York’s sideline. But none of them is a stranger to Buffalo, and their previous encounters give us a few interesting games to revisit.
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Aaron Glenn has seen plenty of Josh Allen
Aaron Glenn is in his second season as the Jets’ head coach, but his history with Josh Allen goes back to his four seasons as defensive coordinator for the Detroit Lions. And if Glenn was hoping a change of teams would make Allen any easier to deal with, the results so far haven’t offered much encouragement.
The two first met on Thanksgiving Day in 2022, when Buffalo traveled to Detroit and came away with a 28-25 victory. Allen threw for 253 yards and two touchdowns, added another 78 yards and a touchdown on the ground, and helped set up Tyler Bass’s game-winning field goal with a 36-yard completion to Stefon Diggs in the final seconds.
Their next meeting came in December 2024, and this time Glenn had one of the NFL’s best teams behind him. Detroit entered the game at 12-1, riding an 11-game winning streak and looking every bit like a Super Bowl contender. But Allen wasn’t particularly impressed. He threw for 362 yards and two touchdowns while adding 68 rushing yards and two more scores in Buffalo’s 48-42 win. The Lions failed to sack him, and the Bills piled up 559 yards of total offense.
That gave Allen 761 combined passing and rushing yards and seven total touchdowns in two games against Glenn’s Detroit defenses, with the Bills winning both.
Glenn got another opportunity when he took over as head coach of the Jets in 2025. Buffalo won their first meeting that September, 30-10, although Allen’s numbers were considerably quieter. He threw for 148 yards, rushed for 59 and didn’t account for a touchdown. The Bills didn’t need a big afternoon from their quarterback to take care of business.
Allen sat out the regular-season finale against New York, which Buffalo won 35-8, leaving Glenn still looking for his first victory against Allen as a head coach or defensive coordinator.
Three meetings, four if you count Allen handing the ball to James Cook to get his name in the books last January, three (four) Buffalo wins. Glenn has seen Allen put up big numbers, and he’s seen the Bills win without needing him to. Neither scenario has worked particularly well for the Jets’ head coach.
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Brian Duker knows Josh Allen, too
If Aaron Glenn was hoping to find someone who could help him figure out Josh Allen, he certainly didn’t have to spend much time explaining the problem to his new defensive coordinator.
Brian Duker worked alongside Glenn in Detroit from 2021 through 2023, serving as the Lions’ safeties coach in 2022 before moving into the defensive backs role in 2023. That means Duker was also on the sideline for Buffalo’s Thanksgiving victory in Detroit, when Allen accounted for three touchdowns and led the Bills to a 28-25 win.
But Duker’s experience against Allen doesn’t end there. He spent the next two seasons with the Miami Dolphins as their pass game coordinator and secondary coach, giving him four more opportunities to face Buffalo’s quarterback.
The first came in September 2024, when Buffalo rolled to a 31-10 victory in Miami. Allen threw for just 139 yards and one touchdown, but with James Cook scoring three times and the Bills’ defense giving Tua Tagovailoa fits, there wasn’t much reason to ask Allen to do more.
The rematch in November was a different story. Allen threw for 235 yards and three touchdowns as Buffalo needed a 61-yard field goal from Bass in the closing seconds to escape with a 30-27 victory.
Duker got two more chances in 2025, and this time the Dolphins managed to split the series. Allen threw for 213 yards and three touchdowns in Buffalo’s 31-21 September win, then added 306 passing yards and two touchdowns in the November rematch. But Miami came away with a 30-13 victory, giving Duker something Glenn hasn’t managed in his previous meetings with Allen — a win.
Across those four games against Miami’s secondary, Allen completed 93 of 127 passes for 893 yards, nine touchdowns and three interceptions. Buffalo won three of the four.
Now Duker is back alongside Glenn, this time with the title of defensive coordinator. Glenn is handling the defensive play-calling, but Duker brings two seasons of experience preparing Miami’s secondary to face Allen twice a year. Between the two coaches, there’s no shortage of familiarity with Buffalo’s quarterback. Whether that familiarity actually helps them stop him is another question.
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Frank Reich returns to a familiar rivalry
For longtime Bills fans, Frank Reich is a name that needs little introduction. Before Josh Allen was making a habit of pulling off the seemingly impossible, Reich was the quarterback behind one of the greatest comebacks in NFL history.
Reich spent 10 seasons in Buffalo as Jim Kelly’s backup, playing a role in the Bills’ four consecutive Super Bowl appearances. But it was January 1993 that secured his place in Buffalo history. With Kelly injured and the Bills trailing the Houston Oilers 35-3 in the third quarter of the Wild Card playoff game, Reich led Buffalo all the way back for a 41-38 overtime win. It’s a game that Bills fans haven’t forgotten, and one that still comes up whenever Buffalo finds itself facing a seemingly impossible deficit.
Reich’s playing career eventually took him to New York, where he spent the 1996 season with the Jets. Among his teammates that year was a young cornerback named Aaron Glenn. Thirty years later, the two are reunited, this time with Glenn as head coach and Reich running the Jets’ offense.
And unlike Glenn and Duker, Reich isn’t trying to figure out how to stop Josh Allen. His job is to put together an offense capable of keeping up with him, something he’s had some success doing against Buffalo in the past.
As head coach of the Indianapolis Colts, Reich faced the Bills three times, including once in the playoffs. His first meeting came in October 2018, when Indianapolis handed Buffalo a 37-5 loss. Of course, Allen was sidelined with an elbow injury for that game, and it was Derek Anderson under center for the Bills.
Their next meeting came in January 2021, when Allen and the Bills defeated Reich’s Colts 27-24 in the AFC Wild Card round. Indianapolis put up 472 yards of offense that afternoon, but Buffalo held on for its first playoff victory in 25 years.
Reich got some revenge the following November, when the Colts traveled to Buffalo and handed the Bills a 41-15 defeat. Jonathan Taylor ran for 185 yards and four touchdowns, caught another touchdown pass and accounted for five of Indianapolis’ six trips to the end zone. The Colts finished with 370 yards of offense, and Buffalo never really found an answer for the Indianapolis rushing game.
That gives Reich a 2-1 record against Buffalo as a head coach, with his offenses scoring a combined 102 points in those three meetings. And those weren’t exactly easy defenses to face. Reich’s Colts went up against a Buffalo defense featuring All-Pro safeties Jordan Poyer and Micah Hyde, along with Pro Bowl linebacker Tremaine Edmunds. and still managed to put up 41 points in their last meeting.
This time, Reich’s challenge looks a little different. While those earlier matchups featured some of the best talent Buffalo has had in its secondary, Sunday’s game will require answers for a defensive front featuring Greg Rousseau, Ed Oliver and Bradley Chubb. And unlike his days in Indianapolis, Reich won’t have Jonathan Taylor to lean on.
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Glenn and Duker have seen Allen at his best, while Reich knows what it takes to put points on the board against Buffalo. Between the three of them, there’s no shortage of experience, but that hasn’t translated into a whole lot of wins.
Buffalo has won five straight against New York, and Allen has already given this coaching staff plenty to think about. Sunday offers another opportunity to extend that streak and remind the Jets that knowing what’s coming doesn’t necessarily mean they can stop it.
