Three weeks ago, when the Patriots dressed down the Bills in Buffalo with a three-pass performance that seemed to be more of an attempt at demoralization than an actual game plan, it looked like Bill Belichick was casting his division rival completely adrift with the intention that they would arrive in Foxborough for the Week 16 rematch too emotionally battered to mount a comeback.
Sean McDermott was flustered, downplaying Belichick’s role in the win. The Bills’ best defensive players were flustered, staging a miniature coup against a tenured beat reporter at the postgame press conference (something they didn’t forget about after this week, by the way).