ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (WHEC) \u2013 The Buffalo Bills came back late to finish the preseason with a perfect 3-0 record, defeating the Pittsburgh Steelers, 28-27.<\/p>\n
FIRST QUARTER: Pittsburgh Steelers \u2013 14, Buffalo Bills \u2013 3<\/p>\n
Preseason games don\u2019t count, and the Buffalo Bills have to be happy about that. The Steelers scored after recovering a muffed punt by Ray Davis and then after a Mitch Wishnowsky punt that traveled 19 yards and set Pittsburgh up on the Bills\u2019 28-yard-line.<\/p>\n
Buffalo opened things on a 13-play, 59-yard drive that ended in a field goal, but after that, it was a quarter made up of mistakes and points given up.<\/p>\n
One small positive? Shane Buechele ended the quarter going 9-of-13 for 68 yards. Two of his completions were caught by Skyler Bell, which is also a positive thing, as the rookie receiver missed the first two preseason games due to injury.<\/p>\n
HALFTIME: Pittsburgh Steelers \u2013 14, Buffalo Bills \u2013 10<\/p>\n
The second quarter definitely agreed more with Buffalo, as the Bills scored the only points of the period on a 6-play, 49-yard drive capped off by a Frank Gore Jr. rushing TD. Gore Jr. and Ian Wheeler are in a battle for potentially making the team as a fourth running back, so that touchdown actually means a lot more than you might guess.<\/p>\n
Skyler Bell also added on his two catches in the first quarter for two more, now up to four receptions for 35 yards. And it\u2019s been all Shane Buechele under center, going 14-of-22 on passes.<\/p>\n
On defense, one player of note is Keonta Jenkins. The linebacker had five tackles in the half, including one sack of Steelers QB Will Howard. The Bills had three sacks in the half as a team, with Andre Jones Jr. and Phidarian Mathis accounting for the other two.<\/p>\n
THIRD QUARTER: Pittsburgh Steelers \u2013 21, Buffalo Bills \u2013 17<\/p>\n
The MVP of this game might not end on the winning side, but Skyler Bell has proven his worth on this Bills 53-man roster and potentially as a guy to watch this season. The rookie WR took a handoff 28 yard to the house, showcasing speed and his ability to be a gadget player. He ends the quarter with five catches for 47 yards and a rushing TD of 28 yards.<\/p>\n
Also separating himself is running back Frank Gore Jr., who has 10 rushes for 27 yards and five catches for 45 yards. Especially with Ty Johnson still injured, having a back that can catch the ball is a big deal for the Bills at the moment.<\/p>\n
But as for the game? Bills trail by a score heading into the fourth.<\/p>\n
END OF GAME: Buffalo Bills \u2013 28, Pittsburgh Steelers \u2013 27<\/p>\n
Okay, okay, I KNOW I said at the start of the game how the preseason doesn\u2019t matter. But when a fringe player scores a touchdown with one minute left and the third string quarterback delivers an off-balance dime to a fringe wide receiver for the two-point conversion and one-point lead? That\u2019s not a bad way to move into the regular season.<\/p>\n
Of course, it was Ian Wheeler rushing it up the gut and Dante Pettis catching the game winning conversion, which should make cut decisions even harder for Joe Brady and the staff.<\/p>\n
And the splash play? That belonged to Damar Hamlin, with his second interception of the preseason.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (WHEC) \u2013 The Buffalo Bills came back late to finish the preseason with a perfect…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":273813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[73,75,74],"class_list":["post-273812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=273812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/273813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=273812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=273812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=273812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}