Top 3 Things We Learned

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Top 3 things we learned from Buffalo Bills at Los Angeles Rams | Week 14

Dec 08, 2024 at 11:00 PM

Alec White

Content Coordinator

The Buffalo Bills (10-3) had their seven-game win streak snapped by the Los Angeles Rams in a 44-42 finish, the highest scoring game of the NFL season so far.

Here are the top three things we learned from Bills-Rams:

1 — Unraveling the final minutes

Sunday's game between the Bills and Rams was the first game in NFL history in which each team scored 40+ points with no turnovers. Still, it came down to the final minute to decide one of the most entertaining games of the season.

Trailing 44-35 with 1:54 to play and all three timeouts available, the Bills had the ball still with a chance at coming back from what once was a 17-point deficit. A 25-yard completion to Amari Cooper, a 4th down 34-yard pass interference against the Rams, a 9-yard run by Allen and a pass interference call against the Rams in the end zone set the Bills up at the LA 1-yard line with 1:11 remaining.

It's at this point where the Bills opted for a QB sneak by Allen. The QB already had two 1-yard rushing TDs on the day, but this time he was stopped for no gain. Instead of letting the clock run down under a minute, Buffalo opted to take a timeout, thus ensuring they'd need to recover an onside kick in order to get the ball back.

"We used what we thought was our best play all year, which is a 1-yard quarterback sneak by Josh. Had to use a timeout. Just felt like that was the best course of action for us right there," McDermott said.

McDermott explained the rationale behind taking a timeout, saying the team was "underneath a time overall where we felt like we could get the ball back with a legit chance to win the game with no timeouts."

Additionally, he didn't want more time to continue to tick off the clock as players got reset following the unsuccessful sneak.

"Just felt like, you're in a pile, No. 1. Right? Josh is in the pile, to unload the pile, get back on the line, that takes some time, so whether you're going to clock it at that point, just to get up off the pile to do all that takes longer than you'd like in that situation," he said.

Allen put the blame on himself for the play, telling reporters that he should've scored on the first attempt. McDermott said the coaching staff will examine their process to learn what they could've done differently.

"We'll go back and look at it again, I promise you that," he said.

Allen got over the goal line on the second attempt to make it 44-42. Buffalo couldn't recover the onside kick, leaving them two timeouts and 1:00 on the clock. The Bills used their remaining timeouts and the Rams drained the clock all the way down to :06 remaining before fourth down.

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The punt went into the end zone but the clock had already expired. McDermott confirmed postgame that the special teams unit only had nine men on the field, which prevented them from trying to be aggressive on a potential block.

"We didn't have enough guys on the field to do that so that's something we got to figure it out," he said.

The Bills entered the fourth quarter down 38-21 and rode a wave of two touchdowns in a span of six minutes to pull within a field goal.

Buffalo's defense got a stop on 3rd-and-6 from their 37-yard line, however the Rams were called for holding and the Bills elected to accept the penalty instead of going to 4th down. Based on how the game had gone, McDermott felt that Rams HC Sean McVay would've gone for it from that spot, so they took the 10 yards to initially back LA out of field goal range.

"Take them out of points right there. They were probably going to go for it anyway based on the way Sean (McVay) handled the next third or fourth down there," McDermott said.

The Rams got 11 yards on 3rd-and-16 and opted to go for it on 4th down. They picked up 11 yards on a reception by Tutu Atwell. LA scored three plays later on a screen pass to Puka Nacua to widen the gap back to 44-35.

2 — No answers for Rams offense

It was tough sledding all around for the Bills defense as they struggled to stop anything the Rams potent offense dialed up. Los Angeles scored on six of their eight possessions, the other two being a drive right before halftime and the punt at the end of the game.

Buffalo allowed 44 points, the most in a regular season game since the 2018 season opener (47 vs. Baltimore).

"Didn't play to our standard, didn't feel like we had the urgency starting out," LB Terrel Beranrd said. "Didn't play well enough to win at all."

At the time LA went up 31-14 on their first drive of the second half, Buffalo had given up 296 total yards on 48 plays. The Rams had registered 21 first downs and had possessed the ball for over 25 minutes.

"We feel like the offense kept us in the game the whole way through, gave us the opportunity and we just couldn't get it done. So we'll go back, look at it, watch the tape, learn from it, and get better and move on," Bernard added.

The Bills had no answers for QB Matthew Stafford, his two star receivers Puka Nacua and Cooper Kupp, and RB Kyren Williams.

Kupp and Nacua combined for 254 receiving yards and two touchdowns on 17 catches. All other Rams pass catchers had 66 yards combined and no touchdowns on six catches. Williams added 87 rushing yards and two scores.

Bernard credited the Rams and Stafford for being able to get to the matchups they wanted vs. man and zone coverage.

"We were in man early on, gave up some plays, pass rush wasn't getting there, rush and coverage not working together, then moved to zone. I think they did a good job. They did a good job manipulating us in our zone coverages and finding soft spots," he said. " But at the end of the day, we gotta work together."

Sunday's loss marked the first game this season Buffalo did not force a takeaway.

3 — Allen delivers historic game despite loss

Josh Allen had a performance for the ages as he became the first player in NFL history with 3 pass TD and 3 rush TD in a regular season game. His 6 total TDs are the most by an NFL player this season.

However, Allen joins some unfortunate company as just the 8th NFL player all-time to record 6 or more TDs and still wind up on the losing side. Strangely, the last time it occurred was five years ago to the day (Dec. 8, 2019) when Saints QB Drew Brees had 6 TDs in a 48-46 loss to the 49ers.

Allen tied Tom Brady and Drew Brees (9) for the most games all-time with 3+ passing and 1+ rushing TD. He also recorded his 5th game with 2+ passing TDs and 2+ rushing TDs, surpassing Steve Young for the most in NFL history.

McDermott described Allen's game as "incredible" but added, "we got to do a better job around him."

In addition to Allen's stellar day, the Bills also had standout performances from their pass catchers. RB Ty Johnson had a career-long 41-yard TD reception, WR Amari Cooper had 95 receiving yards (most since joining BUF), WR Khalil Shakir led the team with 106 yards and WR Mack Hollins set a career-high for TDs in a season (5).

Allen said that his focus this week will be finding ways to get the offense in a rhythm earlier in the game. The Bills had just 14 of their 42 points in the first half.

"We've got to find ways to score before the half and score after the half, so didn't do our part either," he said. "Just trying to go out there and execute the play call to the best of our ability, and we didn't do that well enough tonight."

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Buffalo Bills vs San Francisco 49ers, Regular Season, December 08, 2024 at Highmark Stadium.

Ben Green/Buffalo Bills

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Buffalo Bills vs San Francisco 49ers, Regular Season, December 08, 2024 at Highmark Stadium.

Ben Green/Buffalo Bills