The Buffalo Bills are facing the Detroit Lions in tonight's historic home opener at the new Highmark Stadium, and Bills Mafia are ready to cheer on their team. With it being such a big night, it does come with worries that the Lions may spoil the evening with a road upset in front of a national Thursday night audience.
After beating the Houston Texans by a final score of 36-31, there were still some areas the Bills needed to improve on for tonight's matchup. Let's take a look at two areas of concern that the Bills need to fix in order to come out victorious and start the season 2-0.
2 issues Bills Mafia should be weary of heading into tonight's game
1. Lack of defense in Week 1
The Bills' new-look defense is still going to take time for it to turn into a unit offenses will fear to play against. But Game 1 was an indication that there are a lot of things the team needs to correct for tonight's contest.
The team needs to be more aggressive with their pass rush in tonight's matchup and not just in key moments, like when Greg Rousseau forced the game-winning strip sack on Texans quarterback CJ. Stroud and the Bills recovered the ball to seal the win.
The Bills also need to frustrate Lions quarterback Jared Goff all night long to create turnovers. The Bills will have more of an opportunity to do so against an air-raid, pass-happy offense such as the Lions'. They will also have to contain wide receivers Amon-Ra St. Brown and Jameson Williams by playing lockdown man coverage and staying with them the whole time on their routes.
2. Penalties
The Bills had 10 accepted flags for 85 yards, with defensive holds, ineligible players downfield, and a crushing blindside block on a great punt return. While they didn't affect the outcome of the game entirely, these penalties are unacceptable and may cost them a game later in the early part of the season if not in tonight's Lions game.
Most of those penalties are due to the fact that the Bills' new defense involves playing more man coverage and having their cornerbacks get sticky and handsy on the ball and on a receiver to avoid giving up a potential touchdown.
They also had a few pre-snap penalties such as false starts and holds, which can affect the drive and make coaches furious. They will need to focus more on cleaning up the pre-snap penalties, as those are controllable and can be fixed, unlike the effort penalties on defense.
Perhaps none of those penalties were even remotely as upsetting as Damar Hamlin's defensive holding penalty on third and nine. The Bills will need to be more disciplined on man coverage and especially in blocking on special teams.
That will extend drives for the Lions and give them unnecessary extra yardage that their high-powered offense capitalized on last week in their 31-30 overtime win vs. the New Orleans Saints.
While the Bills showed a strong offense in their Week 1 win over the Houston Texans, the team needs to show up tonight with their game faces on to overcome the defensive and penalty challenges from Sunday's game.
Add us as a preferred source on Google