Things didn’t work out the way Bills coach Rex Ryan hoped on Sunday as his team fell behind 37-13 to the Patriots before staging a late, futile rally in what turned out to be a 40-32 loss.
Ryan’s been on the wrong side of uglier scores than that in past matchups with the Patriots, but this one left him sounding like a man who was willing to rethink his vow not to kiss Bill Belichick’s rings.
“I’m going to tell you exactly like I told our team, this loss is squarely on one man’s shoulders,” Ryan said, via the team’s website. “It’s on my shoulders. Yeah we’ve got to get better as a team no question, but I have to get better. Belichick outcoached me, no question about it and that’s how it ended up. It’s unfortunate. The plan has to be better on defense. You can’t give up 500 yards and beat anybody. Then we turn it over three times. But we did a [expletive] job and it’s my responsibility. Our team will get better, but it starts with me getting better and I’m looking forward to next week.”
Belichick gave the credit to his players rather than himself when told what Ryan said and several Bills players raised their hand to take the blame after the loss, but Alex Flanagan of NFL Media reports that cornerback Stephon Gilmore and running back LeSean McCoy both said they thought the team was overcharged emotionally for the contest.
That’s reflected in the slew of penalties that the Bills took over the course of the afternoon and it’s an outcome you could see coming after a week of intense buildup for the game in Buffalo. Whatever their control of their emotions, they couldn’t control Tom Brady or the Patriots pass rush on the field and that left them with a painful loss.