by TYLER HATHAWAY
The Buffalo Bills will be competing in the playoffs for the seventh straight season. But unlike the previous five, the No. 6 seed Bills will be starting their playoff run on the road, heading south to face the Jacksonville Jaguars this Sunday. The third-seeded Jaguars enter the contest red-hot, while Buffalo is coming off of an emotional yet emphatic win over the New York Jets in Week 18. Here’s the breakdown:
No. 6 seed BUFFALO BILLS (12-5/AFC East)
vs.
No. 3 seed JACKSONVILLE JAGUARS (13-4/AFC South)
Sunday, Everbank Stadium, 1:00 pm.
Storyline #1: Injuries stacking up for Buffalo
Injuries have plagued the Bills all season, and they will continue to impact Buffalo throughout the postseason.
The Bills had six players as non-participants for practice on Wednesday, including Matt Milano, Terrell Bernard, Maxwell Hairston, and Matt Prater. Quarterback Josh Allen, while practicing, has been nursing a foot injury for the past few weeks. Additionally, Ed Oliver and Tyler Bass have been out for basically the entire season.
Hairston’s injury is especially frustrating, as the rookie tweaked his ankle in the late stages of the Bills 35-8 win over New York this past Sunday. In response to the injury, Buffalo has recently signed cornerback Daryl Porter Jr. to the practice squad. It is currently unknown who of the six non-participants will play and who won’t, but Hairston is unlikely to suit up this Sunday.
Storyline #2: Jacksonville, Lawrence dominant as of late
Jacksonville is entering Sunday’s game as one of the hottest teams in the NFL. The Jaguars have won eight straight games, and outscoring their opponents 259-116 over that span.
One of the biggest reasons for successful stretch is due to the play of their quarterback. Trevor Lawrence has been excellent in the past few months, touting a 19-5 touchdown-to-interception ratio and 251 passing yards per game while also rushing for seven touchdowns.
The biggest highlight of their recent run came in Week 16, when Jacksonville went on the road to Denver and beat the now one seed in the AFC Broncos by two touchdowns. In that game, Lawrence accrued 299 yards of total offense and had four touchdowns. It is the only loss Denver has suffered in its past 14 games.
Storyline #3: Bills’ playoff road game struggles
Since Sean McDermott was hired before the 2017 season, Buffalo has yet to win a playoff game on the road. The Bills have played in five road playoff games in nine seasons under McDermott and are 0-5 in that span.
This is in addition to the fact that there is some pressure on the Bills to get it done without the Kansas City Chiefs in the playoffs, who have ended Buffalo’s season in four of the past five seasons.
“I think we’re taking it one game at a time,” said Allen. “We’re not focused on what’s happened in the past. We’re a completely different team than we were last year and the year before that, and so on and so forth. So, again, our job is to play the Jacksonville Jaguars at 1 o’clock on Sunday, and that’s what we’re going to do.”
The interesting thing is that this week’s game is a rematch of a McDermott’s first playoff game in Buffalo back in the 2017 season. The sixth-seeded Bills went down to face the third-seeded Jaguars, with Jacksonville coming out on top in a slogfest that had a final score of 10-3.
Key to the game #1: Contain Travis Etienne
Despite the strong play of Lawrence in these past few months, the Bills need to make sure they hone in on the other man in Jacksonville’s backfield, running back Travis Etienne.
The fifth-year running back rushed for 1,107 yards and seven touchdowns in the regular season while also tallying 292 receiving yards and six touchdown catches. However, Etienne has taken more of a subdued role during the winning streak, only rushing for more than 80 yards once since the streak started.
But given the fact that the Bills run defense finished 31st in the NFL, a guy who finished 11th in the NFL in rushing yards is still someone you need to game plan for. The Bills pass defense was statistically one of the best in the NFL, and despite Jacksonville’s recent success through the air, it would make sense that the Jaguars plan to try and exploit Buffalo’s lackluster run defense on Sunday.
Key to the game #2: Vintage Josh Allen performance
Josh Allen needs to be the Josh Allen that Bills fans know and love against the Jaguars.
The defending MVP limped to the finish line at the end of the regular season while battling a foot injury. Allen didn’t play in Week 18 against the Jets, and only threw for a total of 392 yards and no touchdowns in the two prior games against the Cleveland Browns and Philadelphia Eagles.
Obviously those kind of stats won’t result in wins in the postseason. However, if there is one quarterback you can rely on to be great in the playoffs, it’s Josh Allen. In his 13 career playoff games, Allen has completed 66 percent of his passes for 3,359 yards with 25 passing touchdowns to only four interceptions (with three of them coming in one game, that the Bills won).
X-Factor: The Bills’ wide receiver core
Buffalo has arguably had the worst wide receiver group in the NFL this season in terms of production. Khalil Shakir led the way for receivers with 72 catches and 719 yards. But no other wideout on the Bills has come even close to that statline.
Second-year pass-catcher Keon Coleman is the only other Bills receiver with more than 25 catches, finishing the season with 38 catches for 404 yards. However, it is important to note that eight of those catches and 112 yards came in the first game of the season, and also that Coleman has been a healthy scratch for four games. After that, it’s Josh Palmer with 22 catches, and Tyrell Shavers with only 15.
Gabe Davis was brought back at around the midway point of the season and has caught 12 passes, and in total the entire receiver core has been reorganized and shaken up throughout the year as Buffalo has struggled to find a group that can provide consistent success.
If there’s any good news for Buffalo, its that tight ends Dalton Kincaid, Dawson Knox, and Jackson Hawes have combined to catch 91 passes for the Bills this year. However, on Sunday, it can’t just be the tight ends who get open for Allen.
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