Travis ruins Flutie's return

Former Bills QB Doug Flutie is as calm as a cucumber as the Bills try to put a little pressure on him. Flutie was unsucessful in getting the Chargers back to tie the Bills late in the game.

[AP Photo/David Duprey]

Everything was in place for a storybook finish. The former Buffalo Bills players were in the game and making a strong statement to the team that had cut them loose two seasons ago. Steve Christie, the Bills all-time scoring leader had kicked field goals for 39 and 53 yards. Now it was Doug Flutie's turn to produce some magic.

Flutie, seeing his first action of the year, had guided the San Diego Chargers down the field for Christie's 53-yarder that tied the game at 13. Now he had 50-yards and under a minute to tie the game up again after the Bills scored in the last minute. Could pull another rabbit out of his hat as he had so many times while a Buffalo Bills?

Things just didn't turn out the way Flutie wanted them to in his glorious return to Ralph Wilson Stadium. A dropped pass and a gaffe by a receiver who did make a catch hurt Flutie's chances of turning in another miracle in the Stadium that he helped get renovated. With just under half a minute to go, Flutie had to air the ball out similar to his famous Hail Mary pass of his Boston College lore. Unfortunately for him, both were over thrown and the last one was tipped by a Bills defender and the time ran out. As a result, the Bills beat the Chargers 20-13 and moved back to .500 with a 7-7 record.

Henry saves the day

Bills' running back Travis Henry plows in for his first of 2 touchdowns against the San Diego Chargers. Henry churned up 144 yards, including a 27 yard bolt against the Bolts in the last minute for the game winner.

[AP Photo/David Duprey]

Travis Henry once again was the gem of the Bills offense. He churned up 144 yards on 22 carries, an amazing 6.5 yards per carry. What's more, he scored the game-winning touchdown with just 52 ticks left on the clock. With the Bills on the Chargers 26, Henry skirted around right end and was off to the races for his second TD of the game.

"It was a play call to the right hand side," said Henry. "Ruben Brown did a great job going up inside and the outside was wide open. I saw daylight and scored."

Henry was the saving grace for the Bills offense which had a horrendous day otherwise. With the temps hovering around the mid-30s, Bills quarterback Drew Bledsoe had his least productive day as a Bill. He passed for a season low of 107 yards on just 11 completions out of 33 passes. Once again, the Bills coaching staff went to the air too much when they had a thorough bred named Henry raring to go to town.

"Some times you have to win ugly and that is what happened today," admitted Bledsoe.

On three Bills scoring drives (one touchdown and two field goals), the Chargers were called for interference and it set the Bills up each time. On the Bills first touchdown drive, there was a 26-yard pass interference penalty on Chargers' Rodney Harrison when the Bills had a 3rd-and-5, putting the ball on the San Diego 33. After a 18-yard Henry gallop to the Chargers 15, the Chargers Alex Moulden was flagged for an 11-yard pass interference penalty, putting the ball on the Chargers 4. From there, Henry took it in to give the Bills the first lead of the game.

Two interference calls on San Diego led to a field goal of 42 and by Mike Hollis. It was Molden again getting flagged for a 21-yard pass interference infraction setting up the field goal.

"The Charges came in and their play was to just harass our guys to try and eliminate the big plays that we have been making. And because of that they had a lot of penalty yards against them that gave us some big plays on our scoring drives. But because of their style, it was one of those days that we did not throw for a lot of yards."

Battle of the Drews is a bust

It was billed as "Drew vs Drew." The feature event turned out to be pretty much a flop. While Bledsoe was shooting blanks, Drew Brees wasn't doing much better. Brees completed 13 of 24 for only 148 yards and no scores. The only thing the two Drews did right was not to turn the ball over as both didn't have a pick.

"It was a tough day to throw the ball on both sides," said Bledsoe, who had an average gain of only 3.24 per completion. "They did a lot of things blitz wise, to try and get some pressure. Then they grabbed and held our receivers to try to keep from getting off the ball and when we had our shots down field they just felt free to grab them so we could not hit the big plays."

Bills D steps up

The Bills defense had probably their best game of the season. The not only shut down the Chargers aerial game, but limited Bolts running back LaDainian Tomlinson to110 yards. He did score from 2 yards out, but that mainly was the most damage he did besides opening up the game with a 31 yard burst.

The Bills, who have had problems stopping the run all year, came up and stuffed it when they had to the most. Henry had another fumble in Buffalo territory which could have proven disastrous, but the Bills defense prevented the Chargers from scoring on that drive. To some, that was turning point of the game.

"That is tremendous," Bledsoe said about the defense stopping the Chargers from scoring after the Henry fumble. "For them to step up like in that situation was a huge point in the game."

Bills Talk

The talk of the town was Henry after the game. Even the Chargers were singing his praise.

"He's very fast, so you can't go up there and just try to knock him out," lauded Chargers safety Rodney Harrison. "He's so low to the ground and he's so powerful. But if you try to sit on him, he'll run right around you. Those guys 5-8 and 5-9 are really tough to tackle because they're so thick and strong in the legs and they can outrun you to the corner. He's a good back."

Bills quarterback Drew Bledsoe gets off pass as former Bill Marcellus Wiley puts the heat on in second quarter action.

[AP Photo/David Duprey]

While the Bills top two receivers, Eric Moulds and Peerless Price only had 8 grabs between them, Moulds was appreciative of Henry's performance.

"Travis had an outstanding game," said Moulds. "He ran the ball well and broke a lot of tackles. I caught myself watching him one time. He made four guys miss him in the backfield and had a big run after stiff-arming a guy. That's the type of back he is."

Henry was asked in his post game interview if he took pride in the fact that he scored the wining touchdown (which was a pretty obvious fact).

"I take great pride in that," agreed Henry. "I have been waiting for an opportunity like this all season. And today I had that chance to carry the football team and I am happy that I stepped up to the plate."

"It's almost gotten to the point where you say, "Don't even worry about that guy, block these,' because Travis is going to run over him. He's done that all year," lauded Trey Teague.

"This time of year, the weather is perfect to run the football," said Henry. "Before the game we knew that we had to come in with a balanced attack. We knew that we had to run the ball on them because they play cover two at times and we knew when they gave us that look on defense we would be able to run the ball. We did well. The offensive line blocked well and when we had opportunities to run, we ran well."

Bledsoe was asked if the Chargers took the middle of the field away from him.

"Yes," agreed Bledsoe. "They brought Harrison down into the front a lot of times to try and clog-up the middle of the field. The knew because of the wind and cold t was going to be harder to throw the ball outside."

Meanwhile, in the Chargers dressing room, Flutie had everyone buzzing.

When asked how it was to return to his old stomping grounds, Flutie said, "It was fun. It really was. It was fun to hear it from the crowd a little bit and step into a situation where we were behind and have the opportunity to go and try to win the ball game. We made a couple plays and got ourselves into position and didn't follow thru on it. For me personally, it was fun to step onto the field."

When one of Flutie's receivers threw the ball towards the sidelines after making a reception, it wasted valuable time that the Chargers could have used for an extra play.

"That is a whole other play," said Flutie about the time wasted. "That is a whole other shot. We still could have been in a situation where you throw a ball over the middle, down to about the twenty, go up and spike it. Then take one more crack at the endzone. Instead, it turns into two cracks at the endzone from wherever we were at."

Copyright © 2002 Bills Thunder & Rick Anderson, all rights reserved.