One Stat Recap: Buffalo Bills vs. Jacksonville Jaguars

On Sunday at New Era Field, the Buffalo Bills got off to a hot start, putting up 14 points in the first quarter on the Jacksonville Jaguars. It looked like the game might be heading for a rout given how easily the Bills were moving the ball. Down two scores, the Jags’ offense had not been able to get past their own 35-yard line. Then, Nathaniel Hackett decided to turn to the game over to Leonard Fournette and the ground game. By halftime, Fournette had tallied two touchdowns and the Jaguars had tied the game at fourteen all.

After the halftime break and a couple of stalled drives from each team, chaos broke out. If you were watching the game or were on the internet at all, you likely saw what went down. Read our article for a quick overview and video of the brawl if you somehow missed it. The key part of the scrum/fight was what Leonard Fournette did.

That brings us to the one stat that almost certainly decided the game. Our magical number for Sunday is two—the number of punches that Leonard Fournette threw. Those two punches led to Fournette (and Shaq Lawson) being ejected. The Jaguars still had the ball inside the one-yard line, but now they were without their best goal-line option and had to face a fired-up Bills defense and a rowdy crowd. It went about as poorly as it could’ve and momentum had fully swung back to the Bills. Josh Allen and the offense capitalized on that momentum with a touchdown just seven plays after the ejection. The fight and Fournette’s ejection was the pivotal moment in the Bills’ victory on Sunday.