Two Bills Drive

‘"I don’t care about spoiling," quarterback Alex Van Pelt said. "I just want to end the season on a good note. They had to win today and we came in and stole it from them."’

‘Every year, there’s a perfectly plausible excuse for his failures and usually in his mind, it starts with someone else.’

‘If they beat the Raiders in six days while New England (at Carolina) and Miami (home for the Bills) lose, they can still sneak through as the AFC’s No. 2 seed. And they can still miss the postseason completely, if they lose at Oakland and the Seahawks win at home against Kansas City.’

‘"We had many opportunities not to come to work this week," Williams said. "A lot of people in Buffalo stayed home this week and didn’t go to work. Not one of these guys missed [practice]. There weren’t any focus problems all week. I think that speaks volumes."’

‘How many of you even knew who Mo Unutoa was before yesterday afternoon?’

‘Hansen, a bridge to Buffalo’s Super Bowl era, will celebrate how the football gods smiled down on him in what could be his final season.’

‘Did you really think that with 13 seconds left to play, with no timeouts at your disposal when you took the snap at the Buffalo 24-yard-line, that the Bills were going to jump the short route and forget about defending the end zone?’

‘Gun shy on some fourth downs and another squib kick nearly backfired but Gregg Williams’ guys beat a much more talented team.’

‘”All I’m going to say is the play came in from the sideline and we executed it the best we could,” he said. “I’m not going to say `what if’ because then it looks like I should be calling the plays and whatever play came in was wrong. You guys can make you own decisions based on what happened.”‘

‘”I think we had this game in the bag and let it slip away,” he said. “We did not stay focused. We didn’t do what we needed to do to win.”‘

‘But with defensive end John Abraham injured, Buffalo, which had the 23rd-ranked rushing offense, ripped large swatches out of the Jets’ defense, rushing for 192 yards. Ted Cottrell, the Jets’ first-year defensive coordinator, shook his head and muttered as he left the locker room. “This was not good,” he said.’

‘In the second quarter, the Jets went into the wind, which prevented them from trying a field goal from Buffalo’s 29-yard line as time expired. Edwards asked Hall if he thought he could make the kick — it would have been about a 47-yard attempt — and Hall said no.’

‘The Jets, once thought to be a playoff shoo-in, imperiled their postseason hopes yesterday with a dreadful 14-9 loss to the lowly Bills — a performance eerily reminiscent of … well, last year’s late-season collapse.’

‘He said he thought the Jets had time to run two plays after they had spiked the ball at the Buffalo 24.’

‘Vinny Testaverde threw a pair of interceptions and had no touchdown passes, but he seemed unwilling to accept at least some of the blame for either one of them in the Jets’ 14-9 loss to the Bills yesterday.’