Buffalo Bills: Updated AFC East standings after Week 2
By Brandon Ray
The second week of the NFL season has come and gone for the teams in the AFC East, with the wrap up of the Miami Dolphins vs. New England Patriots Sunday night game. One team remains undefeated, one team improved to .500 on the season while the other went down to .500, and one team still remains winless going into Week 3. Much like the Buffalo Bills vs. New York Jets game last week, there was a divisional matchup between the Miami Dolphins and New England Patriots this week.
All four teams were able to get some clarity about their team moving forward from their Week 1 performances, and now have a better idea as to what they can expect to work on going into next week. While two teams had a high week, the other two face some challenges moving forward into the season.
Here are the updated AFC East standings after Week 2:
4.) New England Patriots - loss vs. Miami Dolphins, 24-17
Oh, how the once mighty franchise has fallen even more since the departure of Tom Brady. Head coach Bill Belichick has kept his team competitive the last two weeks but came up short. On a Sunday night in Foxborough hosting the Miami Dolphins, who just came off an electrifying offensive performance in Los Angeles, the Patriots were looking to pull an upset in front of the home crowd and avoid going 0-5 against quarterback Tua Tagovailoa.
While most fans expected the Dolphins to sling the ball down the field, it was running back Raheem Mostert who led the way on the ground for the Dolphins offense that the Patriots’ defense could not stop. One of the few bright spots on the Patriots defense was rookie cornerback Christian Gonzalez who recorded his first interception of his career and was tied for the second most combined tackles.
The offense for New England looked slow and unable to get much going. They didn’t get their first touchdown until the fourth quarter, but ended up scoring two touchdowns to come within a touchdown of tying the ball game.
On fourth down late in the game, Mac Jones threw it to tight end Mike Gesicki who was not able to reach for the first down and ended up pitching it back to guard Cole Strange who came up short of picking up the first down for the Patriots. With yet another close loss in consecutive weeks, the Patriots find themselves starting at 0-2 for the first time since 2001 and will face the New York Jets next week.