ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — The Broncos were careening toward a three-and-out on the first drive of their first playoff game in nine years. Their first two plays of their wild-card game against the Buffalo Bills gained a total of 2 yards. A rowdy crowd at Highmark Stadium was already making rookie quarterback Bo Nix feel its presence.
It took Nix just two passes from there to put the Broncos into the end zone. First, a 19-yarder over the middle to his trusted veteran target, Courtland Sutton.
Nix then hit Troy Franklin on a 43-yard pass to the end zone, the first rookie-to-rookie connection for a passing touchdown in NFL postseason history. It was a stunning opening salvo given that Nix and Franklin struggled all season to connect on similar deep routes.
“Troy and I were saving that for the playoffs,” Nix said.
T AS IN TOUCHDOWN.
📺: CBS pic.twitter.com/1UZYcSS7aZ
— Denver Broncos (@Broncos) January 12, 2025
Just like that, the “young and dangerous” Broncos had jumped on top of the heavily favored Bills. You can’t win a game on an opening drive, no matter how impressive, but you can send a message.
But Sunday for the Broncos ended up being more about lessons learned. As the next 57 minutes melted off the scoreboard without any more Denver points being added, a harsh one was setting in for the Broncos: in the playoffs, against a talented, tested team like the Bills, the avalanche can start rolling fast.
One wrong step can get you into trouble. A couple more after that and you’re buried.
“It got out of control real quick,” running back Javonte Williams said after a 31-7 loss ended Denver’s season.
GO DEEPER
How Broncos fell apart in second half of 31-7 wild-card loss: Takeaways
The Broncos gave up 210 yards rushing Sunday, 100 of which came across Buffalo’s first two drives alone. The Bills owned the ball for more than 41 minutes. They scored 31 straight points after Denver’s early splash touchdown. They bruised the Broncos and doused them with a cold reality about the difference between reaching the postseason and being a dangerous team once you get there.
“Those guys in the last year did a really good job focusing on their run game and incorporating it with the skill set that Josh (Allen) has,” Broncos coach Sean Payton said. “I was just surprised at the effectiveness of it.”
Payton once counted Bills offensive coordinator Joe Brady and offensive line coach Aaron Kromer among his assistants with the Saints. Payton has known Buffalo head coach Sean McDermott since the two were rival assistants in the NFC East decades ago. That familiarity made the Broncos’ head coach keenly aware of what Buffalo’s brain trust was working on this offseason as they tried to elevate their offense around star quarterback Josh Allen. It also gave him a fairly good guess as to how the Bills would try to attack the Broncos when the two teams met in Sunday’s AFC wild-card game.
Stopping it was another story.
“It sucks because we’re packing our bags up right now,” safety P.J. Locke said. “But this wasn’t the destination for this team. This was just a milestone.”
It can be if the Broncos make the most of the hard-earned lessons Sunday’s game provided. The end of a season came with a thud, the way it eventually does for most teams that enter the playoffs with championship dreams and leave with heartache. The Broncos trailed by just three points at halftime and would have been level with the Bills if the 50-yard field-goal attempt by Wil Lutz that banged off the right upright had drifted a few inches to the left.
“At halftime, I felt comfortable with where we were,” Payton said. “On the road, playing pretty good red-zone defense, forcing field goals. In the second half, we just didn’t play well enough.”
The Broncos made their second red-zone stop of the game to begin the third quarter, holding the Bills to a field goal that extended their lead to 13-7. The response from the Broncos’ erratic offense: three-and-out.
“You have to be close to flawless to win these games,” tight end Adam Trautman said. “We weren’t today.”
Buffalo followed with a quick drive that put them deep into Broncos territory. Then, on fourth-and-1 from Denver’s 24-yard line, Allen made an acrobatic, off-balance throw under pressure that somehow found its way to Ty Johnson as the running back slid for the catch in the back of the end zone, in front of tight coverage from Locke. Broncos cornerback Pat Surtain II was among a host of Broncos on the field who were sure part of Johnson’s lower body hit the back of the end zone line before he secured the catch, but the play held up on replay review.
An absolutely ridiculous catch by Ty Johnson. He immediately secured the catch and had one knee down in-bounds just prior to his foot tapping out of bounds.
📺 #DENvsBUF pic.twitter.com/s758R2n4Ai
— Gene Steratore (@GeneSteratore) January 12, 2025
“I saw what you saw,” Payton said. “They went to (the replay center in) New York and I saw the same feed on the big screen. It was hard to tell.”
The Broncos were still within two touchdowns, but a false start penalty preceded a second straight three-and-out. Denver ran the ball a combined four times on their opening two drives of the third quarter and gained 9 yards.
Then came the big shots from Allen, the MVP candidate whose 55-yard touchdown pass to Curtis Samuel all but buried the Broncos.
“That’s playoff ball where any little mistake can make or break the game,” Broncos defensive end Zach Allen said. “It’s not like the regular season. It’s tough, when you’ve got a young team, to kind of relay that. It’s a little bit of a deal where it’s trial by fire.”
Buffalo responded to Denver’s opening touchdown with poise befitting a team making its sixth straight trip to the postseason. They battered the Broncos on the ground. If it wasn’t James Cook patiently waiting to cut back against the grain into the right hole, it was Allen powering around the edge or even through the teeth of Denver’s defense.
“Cook is a super, super patient runner and they run these gap schemes, and they kept changing the gaps,” Locke said. “He was setting up his blocks and just being super patient. We have to be more disciplined keeping our gaps as they’re moving.”
The Broncos, meanwhile, ran for just 79 yards. More than half of that — 43 yards — came on three Nix scramble runs. No running back had a carry that went for more than 7 yards.
What Buffalo’s offense did to the Broncos’ defense wasn’t unique. The Bills this season have won seven games by 20-plus points, two more than any other team in the league. And Sunday marked the eighth time in the Bills’ last nine games at home that they have scored at least 30 points.
The bigger takeaway is that the Broncos couldn’t come close to keeping pace offensively. Nix completed 13-of-22 passes for 144 yards and a touchdown plus the 43 yards rushing in his first NFL playoff start. He struggled on third down — 2 of 6 for 16 yards — and had a handful of reads and throws on the plays “he’ll want to have back,” Payton said. But he also felt the squeeze of a) Buffalo gobbling up time with its own run game and b) Denver’s inability to run the ball.
“Whenever you’re not in the game running plays, you can get out of rhythm,” Nix said. “But it’s our job to go out there and have a few plays that help us get back in a rhythm. We’ve got to do a better job with that.”
Payton wasn’t ready to reflect on the season, but the wheels were already turning regarding the future.
“You’re constantly evaluating where you’re at and where you need to go,” Payton said. “My mind’s always thinking about what we still need, maybe what’s missing. All of that you take into account. … We have to have a good offseason.”
Sean Payton will look to build on this season’s playoff appearance next season, which will be his third with the Broncos. (Mark Konezny / Imagn Images)
The Broncos have climbed a long way since Payton became the team’s head coach two years ago. But Sunday’s loss reflected the gap they must conquer if they are going to catch the elite in their conference who don’t appear to be fading anytime soon. The Broncos have a clear need for more playmaking talent on offense.
There are pieces around Nix who will improve from more time in Denver’s offense and greater familiarity with the quarterback. Young players like Franklin and Devaugh Vele will continue to improve. But the Broncos don’t have a running back like Cook or tight ends like the ones Allen found with ease Sunday.
What they do have now is a taste of what postseason football is all about. And how much better they will have to be to play deep into January.
“You play this game to reach the highest level,” Nix said. “I don’t ever want to be complacent or comfortable or satisfied that we made the playoffs. That’s something that looks good on the outside, but we play this game to win. … But our trajectory is going up.”
(Top photo: Mark Konezny / Imagn Images)
