BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) — The Buffalo Bills are back at Highmark Stadium for another early season home game. The Houston Texans come to town with a first-year head coach in David Culley and a first-year quarterback in Davis Mills. The point spread for this contest favors Buffalo by 17 points.
Here are the predictions from the WKBW sports staff:
Matt Bove
Oddsmakers believe this game will be a rout. I don't necessarily agree.
That doesn't mean I think the Bills will lose, but 17 points is a massive spread. The Bills have only been bigger favorites twice in franchise history. In 1991 they covered as a 20 point favorite against the Colts but in 1992 they failed to cover as a 19 point favorite against New England.
Now that the history lesson is done, the Bills must take the Texans seriously. Houston hung around with Cleveland in Week 1 and in Week 2 pretty handily knocked off Jacksonville. I know, I know, the quarterback is different these days, but it's hard to write off a quarterback that we really haven't seen play.
In Davis Mills' first start, he was solid, completing 19 of 28 passes for 168 yards and a touchdown. When asked about the Texans' young quarterback, Bills safety Micah Hyde said they need to apply pressure.
"It doesn't matter if it's a rookie or a veteran QB," Hyde said. "It's a young guy that hasn't seen a lot of defenses but we're going to go out there and play our game. At the end of the day, he's smart, he's got a good arm and we're gonna have to plan accordingly."
As for the Bills offense, they need to keep taking what's given to them. Against the Washington Football Team, Josh Allen didn't try to force throws and it led to a huge day for the offense. If he takes a similar approach into this game, which I expect he will, it could be another big day.
The Bills are averaging more than 31 points per game and that should be the bar heading into this matchup. If they can match their season average, they should be heading to Kansas City with a 3-1 record.
Bills: 31, Texans: 19
Season record: 2-1
Jenna Callari:
The Bills are coming off their best performance of the season as a whole and what better way to continue that momentum, than at home against another young QB.
The Bills defense is making things miserable for opposing offenses. They're allowing just an average of 14.7 points a game and in the last two weeks, have forced six turnovers and grabbed seven sacks. The defense doesn't look like they're slowing down and as long as things are good health-wise, I expect them to be on top of their game. Texans QB Davis Mills was sacked four times last week. If his line can't protect him, the Bills may have a field day.
This is also a big week for Tre'Davious White who will be trying to shut down the Texans' best WR in Brandin Cooks. If he can do that, this Texans passing offense is going to have a hard time considering their second best WR has 18 less targets than Cook through the first three weeks.
The Bills offense, meanwhile, is ramping things up and we finally saw that high-powered passing offense we kind of missed during the first two games. With so many weapons, I think the Texans will have a hard time keeping up and shutting multiple players down. The Bills offensive line, once again needs to come up big, after allowing zero sacks last weekend.
I'm 3-for-3 when it comes to random predictions and this week, I'm looking for two things to happen: Tyler Bass with a new season-long field goal [current season long is 48], and a little bit of trickery from the offense for a score.
Bills: 34, Texans: 16
Season record: 2-1
Adam Unger:
These are two teams that are trending in the opposite direction in 2021. And that couldn't be worse news for the Houston Texans. The Bills' offense finally hit its stride in a way I don't think any of us expected against Washington. Last week's win was Buffalo's best football this season.
But the Bills don't necessarily need to play their best ball against Houston to win. After taking advantage of Trevor Lawrence's growing pains in a Week 1 win over Jacksonville, the Texans have lost back-to-back games by double digits. With Davis Mills under center, that's bound to happen again.
Houston assembled a myriad of veterans on offense who are past their prime and not as much of a threat as they used to be. On the other side of the ball, there are some good players for the Texans' defense, but Buffalo's offensive line has continued to improve every week.
This is the type of game Buffalo should win comfortably. And I expect them to do so. Both the offense and the defense are clicking; and handling business against another member of the Andy Reid coaching tree should provide a confidence boost before Buffalo faces big red next week.
Bills: 31, Texans: 13
Season record: 2-1
