For the first time in 23 years — the New England Patriots were scoreless at home. The Buffalo Bills shut down the Patriots 16-to-zero at Foxborough.
The hard hits from Buffalo started during warm ups — when a Bills player shoved quarterback Jacoby Brissett. The problems for the Patriots did not stop there — Brissett was sacked 3 times, the Patriots were forced to punt on 6 occasions, and a 48 yard field goal attempt went wide.
“Generally we’ve been playing well, and today we didn’t play well,” said defensive end Chris Long. “So it’s uncharacteristic in that sense. Everybody prepared hard all week, but we didn’t come out and execute on Sunday.”
Coach Bill Belichick added “nothing was good enough today.”
Sunday’s game was the last of Quarterback Tom Brady’s exile following the Deflate-gate scandal. Brady returns to practice this week, ahead of the team’s match-up against the Cleveland Browns in Ohio.
Wide Receiver Julian Edelman said in a postgame interview after a 16-to-zero loss Sunday, that it’s going to be “great” to have the veteran quarterback return.
“Anytime one of your best players isn’t there, there’s something missing,” said Edelman. “You know we handled a lot of it well, and today we didn’t, so that’s that.”
Sunday’s scoreless game was the first time the Patriots have put up a goose-egg at Foxborough since 1993.
