Shortly after his Bills had thrashed the Broncos, 48-19, Saturday night at Denver’s Empower Field at Mile High, Buffalo coach Sean McDermott received a treasured message of congratulations for his team clinching its first AFC East title in a quarter century.
“I got an email message from Marv Levy tonight, which is just awesome,” McDermott said of the most successful coach in franchise history. “So cool, so humbling … I really appreciate the relationship that he and I have.”
To be sure, Levy’s kind words were merited as it was his team that last hosted a home playoff game before McDermott’s crew earned one against the Broncos.
“I’m just so happy for the fans,” he said. “It’s such a cool place to be a part of because of the work ethic and character of the people in Buffalo … Western New York. I love seeing Bills’ flags wave out in people’s yards. I’m hoping there’s a lot more people buying those flags to give them as Christmas gifts … I’m humbled just to be one part of it.”
And so, according to McDermott, is his team.
“I think it’s so cool that the guys who are so young can tie into the past and know the early 90s … they see the banners hanging in our facility,” he said. “The teams in the early 90s, I should thank the guys that support us in so many ways … Coach Levy, Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas, Steve Tasker, Cornelius Bennett, Bruce Smith and all those guys.
“They live and die with us. It’s one thing to coach your current team, but I always try to feel a responsibility — and I think our players do as well — to do things the right way for those guys because they started this years ago.”
HOWEVER, in the nine-year span from 1988 to ‘96 under Levy, the Bills went 97-47 (plus 11-8 in the postseason) making the playoffs eight times with five division titles, an equal number of AFC Championship Games, and four Super Bowls.
In short, the current Buffalo squad doesn’t see one AFC East crown as mission accomplished.
“It’s great that we’re able to do it for the first time in 25 years,” Buffalo’s Josh Allen admitted. “To be the team and to be the quarterback of a team that does it obviously feels really good. At the same time, that’s not our main goal. We set out to do this in order to give us a chance to do what we really want to do and that’s win a Super Bowl.
“It hasn’t happened in 25 years and I know our fans, Bills Mafia, are probably going crazy right now, but there’s still a lot on the table. We still have two games left in the regular season that we have to finish out.”
He added of Bills owners Terry and Kim Pegula, “to take over and hire the (people) they did for this organization and bring in coach McDermott … the plan that they set out to go out and do, it’s exactly what they said they were going to do. It’s taken a few years, but it means a lot, obviously, to them, it means a lot to coach McDermott. Everything is still in front of us. This just gives us an opportunity, that’s all we can ask for.”
AND McDERMOTT has a long enough memory to recall it was only two years ago that there were those who doubted his “process.”
“We’ve got more work to do,” he said after Saturday’s win. “Tonight’s game — as good as it was — it felt good to be able to enjoy it a little bit the last two or three minutes on the sideline. I’m just really happy to be a part of it. (But) it wasn’t a clean game. We beat ourselves in some situations.
“We needed to win the east … now we’ve won it and a lot of hard work has gone into that. Anything you try to do that’s worth doing, you’ve got to work hard at it. There’s been good moments and there’s been some times where I know people have questioned things. It was 2018 when we were asked a lot about what we were doing and how we were doing it when we were 6-10. A lot of that was necessary growing pains and I really appreciate the way people believed in us and believed in our message.”
McDermott added, “I love any win, but in particular, when it’s a team win. That’s the hard part about this, I can’t get to everyone and thank them … we didn’t do this alone … I didn’t do this alone. There’s people around me and there’s people that have come before us and some no longer work for the Bills.
“I guess I’ll use you (media) guys as the outlet to tell them thank you for all you’ve done for the Bills. It’s a community team, right? We’re one big family, and that’s the cool part about coaching for a team that there’s really a partnership between the fans and the team. That’s what makes it special.”
(Chuck Pollock, a Times Herald senior sports columnist, can be reached at cpollock@oleantimesherald.com)
