Buffalo Bills: Keys to victory against the Los Angeles Chargers in Week 12

Win the Second Half

As all Buffalo Bills fans should know at this point in the season, the Bills have really struggled in the second half and specifically the third quarter. While there is not some silver bullet that will fix all of these problems, playing the Chargers after a bye could help give the team some confidence moving forward in the second half of games.

While the Bills’ struggles in the third quarter are real, they have been somewhat blown out of proportion. Some fans will chalk it up to the coaching staff getting too conservative with the early leads in games, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. With the frequency the Bills have been running the football this year, it wouldn’t be right to pin the struggles on a conservative mind-set or “playing not to lose”. What it has been coming down to is simply execution.

Whether it’s the kind of halftime adjustments the Bills coaching staff is or isn’t making compared to the adjustments the opponents have been making; the Bills simply have not been executing as sharp as they do in the first half compared to the second half for the majority of the season.

Coming off of a bye with extra time to sharpen coaching points and execution, the Buffalo Bills have been gifted a perfect matchup in Week 12 with the Chargers to fix some of these struggles. The Chargers have been part of some of the most disappointing losses of this season. They have 7 losses on the season but have not lost by more than one possession in any of their losses. In those 7 losses, the Chargers were winning at halftime in all but three games.

This shows that the Bills have an opportunity to correct their second-half struggles against a team that is struggling equally or even a bit more than the Bills in the second half of games. With that being said, that is only part of the puzzle for the Bills to earn a victory in Week 12.