Bills vs. Jaguars 2018 live results: Jacksonville holds off Buffalo in Wild Card Round

Both Buffalo and Jacksonville hadn’t been in the postseason in a long time, but Jags advanced with a 10-3 win.

The AFC side of the Divisional playoffs is set thanks to the Jaguars first playoff victory since 2008. Jacksonville ultimately made fewer mistakes than Buffalo to win a 10-3 battle of attrition, prolonging its season by at least one more week. The win means the Jags will advance to face the Steelers in Pittsburgh — the same place they walloped Ben Roethlisberger’s team in a 30-9 Week 5 rout.

That will leave the Titans — the AFC’s other Wild Card winner — with a tough task next weekend. Tennessee has never escaped Foxborough with a win. You’d have to dive all the way back to 1993, when the franchise was still the Houston Oilers, in order to dig up a victory in New England.

So how did we get here? Here’s a look back at Sunday’s action.

Recap

It wasn’t a good game, but Sunday’s AFC Wild Card showdown was probably better than you think.

Huge plays

Losing Tyrod Taylor to a potential concussion effectively squashed the Bills’ comeback hopes.

Doug Marrone failed to challenge a blatantly bad spot that benefited the Bills, but it didn’t matter in the long run.

An 18-play, error filled scoring drive pretty much summed up Sunday’s game in a nutshell. A long, tedious nutshell.

Silly highlights

The game’s leading rusher, Blake Bortles, trucked a terrified cameraman. This may have been the top highlight in a one-touchdown game.

No one was more excited about the Jaguars’ first playoff touchdown in over a decade than the owner’s hip-thrusting son.

Play-by-Play

Final: Jaguars 10, Bills 3

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: Peterman’s next two passes: an intentional grounding call and a Jalen Ramsey interception. The Bills no longer have life.

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: Peterman’s first two plays: a sack-avoiding scramble that converted a key 4th-and-3, then a 14-yard completion to Thompson. The Bills still have life.

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: Taylor’s third-and-5 scramble ended in disaster as Dante Fowler threw him violently to the turf, bouncing his head off the playing surface in the process. Rookie quarterback Nathan Peterman, he of the five-interception half earlier in the season, will take his place in the lineup.

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: Buffalo held the home team to a three-and-out, giving it one last chance to tie the game. The Bills have 1:51 left and zero timeouts to go 63 yards and knot this game at 10-10.

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: With this 18-yard scramble:

Blake BY GOD Bortles became this team’s leading rusher.

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: Buffalo was moving into Jaguar territory when Marrone finally saw a play he could challenge — but just barely. The Jacksonville coach got his flag out onto the field just before the Bills could lock in an 11-yard gain on 2nd-and-10. Officials ruled Charles Clay stepped out of bounds before making his catch, negating the play and forcing Buffalo into third-and-long.

Myles Jack came up with the biggest play of his NFL career on the next play, sacking Taylor to pressure the Bills into a punt.

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: Jacksonville’s ensuing drive wasn’t especially useful or interesting, but it did give us this:

Godspeed, CBS cameraman.

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: A terrible spot gave the Bills an important first down at midfield, and Jags head coach Doug Marrone declined to challenge the call despite it happening just a few feet from him on the Jacksonville sideline.

Fortunately for Marrone, his lack of a challenge didn’t matter. Buffalo’s next three plays gained just four yards before the team was forced to punt. There’s only 11:18 left in the game, and another long touchdown drive could seal the Jaguars first playoff win since 2007.

Third quarter: Jaguars 10, Bills 3

Jaguars 10, Bills 3: Blake Bortles isn’t doing much in the passing game, but he’s been able to gash the Bills on the ground to put his team in the lead. The embattled quarterback has been more effective than tailback Leonard Fournette, scrambling to daylight throughout a 14-play, 86-yard drive that finally snapped this game’s touchdown drought.

But it was Bortles’ arm that found the end zone. His 4th-and-goal play-action pass from inside the 1-yard line hit Ben Koyack on the numbers and gave Jacksonville its first lead of the afternoon. That 8:52 drive made short work of the third quarter, forcing a Buffalo response in the fourth.

Bills 3, Jaguars 3: Micah Hyde’s day may be done as he’s headed to the locker room to be examined for a possible concussion. He may not have appreciated the reception from the Jacksonville fans on his way, squirting the first row with his water bottle as he walked to the tunnel.

Bills 3, Jaguars 3: LeSean McCoy’s 25-yard run is now your longest play of the game. The Bills followed this up with a dropped catch, a -2 yard run, and a third-down throwaway before punting.

Two second half drives. Two punts. Hooray football!

Halftime: Bills 3, Jaguars 3

Bills 3, Jaguars 3: The Bills could have run out the clock on the second quarter — or even put together a drive to close out the half with some points — but Deonte Thompson’s drop would prove costly.

That helped give the Jags the ball at their own 47 yard line with 40 seconds left and two timeouts. A Blake Bortles scramble pushed his team 20 yards downfield and served as the biggest play of the game for either team. Two plays later, he’d avoid Buffalo pressure for another 12 yards and a spot just outside the red zone. His hot streak wouldn’t last, however. He’d give up a costly sack that shut the door on his team’s touchdown hopes. Josh Lambo would even the score at 3-3 with a 44-yard field goal just before time could expire on the half.

Bills 3, Jaguars 0: a Taylor third-down scramble — and a late hit from Yannick Ngakoue — gave the Bills their best field position of the day.

One play later, the Buffalo QB would completely overthrow an open Nick O’Leary in the end zone to keep this game scoreless, but his scrambles would keep the Bills moving forward. He’d push his team all the way to the three before ceding the field to kicker Steven Hauschka — but a costly offsides penalty would turn 4th and 1 to 1st and goal from inside the two-yard line.

But the Bills weren’t content to allow the Jaguars be the only team to march backward from scoring position. An offensive pass interference call and aborted Taylor run moved the team back to the 13-yard line. The drive came to a merciful end when Steven Hauschka kicked a 31-yard field goal to give his team a 3-0 advantage.

Bills 0, Jaguars 0: Jacksonville got the defensive play that could be the catalyst it needs. Myles Jack’s coverage popped a Taylor pass into the air, and Aaron Colvin pulled it down to give the Jaguars the ball at the BUF 35. It’s the first possession either team has had in their opponents’ territory.

The Jags capitalized in true Jacksonville fashion -- by gaining -3 yards and punting from the 38.

Bills 0, Jaguars 0: Blake Bortles just missed a wide open receiver on third-and-6. So far, this game is fulfilling every expectation a Bills-Jaguar game would suggest.

First quarter: Bills 0, Jaguars 0

Bills 0, Jaguars 0: A game defined by weak offensive performances early on started to turn thanks to some nifty passing from Taylor. The Bills quarterback was able to avoid the Jacksonville pass rush and string together a 45-yard drive, but that only pushed Buffalo to midfield — and led to our fifth straight punt of the afternoon.

Bills 0, Jaguars 0: This showdown between Tyrod Taylor and Blake Bortles has started right on schedule — with a pair of opening-drive punts. Bortles’ perfect postseason passing streak lasted upwards of one minute before crashing back to the Florida swampland.

The Bills’ second drive matched the Jaguars’ opening three-and-out...but only by a fraction of a yard.

Another Jags punt minutes later gave this game all the making of a pitcher’s duel. In 10 minutes of play, the two teams combined for twice as many punts (four) as first downs (two).

Despite this being the team’s first playoff appearance since 2000, Bills fans are treating Sunday’s Wild Card showdown like any other game — by putting each other through tables. Even Bill Cowher got into the action.

Before the game

It’s been 18 years since 1999, which happened to be the last season the Buffalo Bills made the postseason and the last time the Jacksonville Jaguars won their division. That is now in the past as both teams head to the AFC Wild Card Round to compete for a chance to get one step closer to the Super Bowl.

This matchup marks the second time these teams have met in the postseason, the first of which was back in 1996 during the AFC Wild Card Playoffs with the Jaguars winning, 30-27. Buffalo, on the other hand, leads the all-time series 8-7, winning the most recent competition, 28-21, in Week 12 of the 2016 season.

The Bills had three players selected to the 2018 Pro Bowl, including safety Micah Hyde, guard Richie Incognito, and running back LeSean McCoy. A snub from the Buffalo roster was linebacker Preston Brown, who led the league with a career-high 144 tackles, marking more than 100 tackles in each of his four seasons in the NFL. Jacksonville one-upped Buffalo, and landed four players on the Pro Bowl roster, including cornerbacks A.J. Bouye and Jalen Ramsey, and defensive linemen Calais Campbell and Malik Jackson.

It should be no surprise that all four of the Jaguars’ Pro Bowl players are on the defensive side of the ball. The team led the NFL with seven defensive scores, with linebacker Telvin Smith claiming two of those touchdowns. Jacksonville also boasts two of the top sack artists in the AFC with Campbell leading the conference with 14 ¹⁄₂ sacks, and Yannick Ngakoue tying for third in the conference with 12 sacks.

Both teams will be more than motivated to find some momentum in the postseason, and as teams who rarely find themselves in this spot, will work like hell to stay in the playoff race for a while.

Pregame reading

• With Wild Card Weekend the first step on the road to a spot in the Super Bowl, here’s the rest of the path to the championship matchup.
• Jacksonville opened as 8.5-point favorites over the Bills.
• As McCoy was carted off the field in Week 17, things looked bleak for him to bounce back in time for this weekend’s matchup, but there’s still a chance he suits up.
• This won’t be the first time these two teams meet, and this time, the Bills offense has a few more weapons:

This will be 16th all-time meeting between these two franchises, and second playoff meeting. The first time the Jaguars and Bills ever played was the 1996 Wild-Card game, which Jacksonville won 30-27 in Orchard Park, New York.

• While the Jaguars’ strong suit is on defense, the offense was off (even by their standards) in last week’s season finale:

Blake Bortles has been the biggest culprit with the turnovers, with five interceptions in the past two games, but Sunday’s loss wasn’t just because the passing game wasn’t working. Nothing seemed to, as the Jaguars generated just 229 total yards and going 6 of 16 on third downs.

• The Bills ended a 17-season postseason drought thanks to a win over the Dolphins, and the Bengals claiming a late-game win over the Ravens:

It’s only the second time in team history that Buffalo makes the playoffs on a tiebreaker, joining the 1981 squad. This year, the Bills sneak past the Ravens thanks to a higher strength of victory. Baltimore’s two wins over the Cleveland Browns are worth less than Buffalo’s wins over the playoff-bound Kansas City Chiefs. In fact, the Ravens have zero wins over playoff teams.