Halloween’s Been Scary for the Buffalo Bills

Halloween can be scary. Will you get a trick? Will you get a treat? When it comes to the Buffalo Bills, playing games on Halloween has been filled with more tricks than treats. Buffalo will play in their seventh Halloween contest this Sunday. So far the results for the Bills faithful have been nothing less than scary!

Ryan Talbot from upstatenewyork.com took a look at the game by game history. Let's start with the first Bills matchup on October 31st in 1965 the Bills faced the Houston Oilers. According to Talbot, Hall of Fame kicker, "George Blanda hit a short field goal in the fourth quarter to help the Oilers knock off the Bills. Although the outcome was not what Buffalo had hoped for,Oilers 19-Bills 17, the 1965 season ended on a positive note with the Bills winning the AFL Championship."

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The Bills second Halloween matchup came in 1971 when they faced the St. Louis Cardinals. The upstatenewyork.com writer described the game, "Buffalo trailed by 12 points in the fourth quarter of this matchup before Alvin Wyatt returned a punt 61-yards for a Bills touchdown. The Bills closed the gap to five points but ultimately fell to the Cardinals, 28-23." That's 0 for 2 on Pumpkin Day for those keeping score.

Buffalo's third last day of October contest came in 1976 against my Jets. Jets quarterback Richard Todd threw for a touchdown and Gang Green kicker Pat Lahey put a couple threw the uprights to take down the Bills 19-14. That would be a trifecta of losses on the day of the jack-o-lantern.

The Bills first victory on the scariest day of the year came in 1999 against the Baltimore Ravens. Buffalo's quarterback was former Boston College standout Doug Flutie. The BC QB known for his magical heroics in the last seconds, hit Jonathan Linton for a game winning TD with 1:35 remaining in the 4th quarter. The Bills beat the Ravens by a score of 13- 10.

On October 31st in 2004 the Bills beat the Cardinals by a score of 38-14, picking up their second treat on the kid's holiday and according to Ryan Talbot, "Buffalo’s most recent Halloween matchup had to go to overtime. Ryan Succop was the hero for the Chiefs hitting a 35-yard yard field goal. The loss was especially crushing as the Bills had lost to the Ravens 37-34 the week prior in overtime. The loss dropped Buffalo to 0-8 on the season." That's evil.

The Bills take on the Miami Dolphins this week. On paper, this is a "trick" for the Dolphins and a "treat" for the Bills. Miami is enduring a surprisingly awful season and Buffalo is coming off of a bye week. Sean McDermott's Bills teams are 4-0 coming off the bye. That's on paper. This is Halloween! Go Bills!