CHICAGO (AP) — Josh Allen and the Buffalo Bills entered the season with high expectations of going deep in the playoffs.
They’ve already won one award by now, securing their third straight division title. It is just one step of what they hope will be a long road to the scepter.
Devin Singletary and James Cook went for long runs to score in the third quarter, and the Bills clinched the AFC East title after beating the Bears 35-13 on Saturday in one of the coldest games in the league. Chicago history.
Josh Allen ran for a touchdown and threw for another in the final minutes of the game, breaking a tie with Hall of Famer Dan Marino for the most touchdowns in a player’s first five NFL seasons.
That was the highlight of an otherwise lackluster performance that helped the Bills (12-3) clinch their third straight division title with their sixth straight win.
“It’s the next step toward our goal: the playoffs, the division title, and we already know what the next goal is,” Allen said.
Buffalo is still on track to take first place in the conference. The Bills remain tied with the West Division leaders Kansas City Chiefs, who beat Seattle, but Buffalo owns the direct tiebreaker after beating the Chiefs in October.
Chicago’s Justin Fields passed for 119 yards and a touchdown but rushed for just a season-low 11 yards after joining Michael Vick and Lamar Jackson last week as the only quarterbacks with 1,000 rushing yards.
The temperature at the start of the game was minus 12 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) with a feeling of minus 24 degrees Celsius (minus 12 Fahrenheit), just a few degrees above the all-time low for a Bears home game. It was Buffalo’s coldest road game since at least 1967.
