NFL Thanksgiving games: Bills beat Lions at death; Cowboys and Vikings win
Tyler Bass made a tiebreaking, 45-yard field goal with two seconds left, lifting the Buffalo Bills to a 28-25 win over the Detroit Lions on Thursday for their second victory in five days at Ford Field.
Josh Allen set up the game-winning kick by starting the drive with a 36-yard pass to Stefon Diggs and running twice for 12 yards before Bass’s winning kick.
Buffalo (8-3) have won two straight to move a half-game ahead of Miami in the AFC East.
The Bills were back in Detroit after the NFL shifted their previous home game against Cleveland to Ford Field because of a winter storm in western New York. They had to work harder for the win on Thursday than they did against the Browns.
Allen threw a go-ahead, five-yard touchdown pass to Diggs with 2:40 left to make it 25-22, but Bass missed the extra point. The Lions then converted on fourth-and-one from midfield with Amon-Ra St Brown’s end-around to set up Michael Badgley‘s game-tying, 51yard field goal with 23 seconds to go. Badgley had missed a 29-yard field goal late in the third and Jared Goff took a sack for a safety in the same quarter, and those mistakes proved to be costly.
Allen had a passing and rushing touchdown in the first half, finishing 24 of 42 for 253 yards to more than make up for throwing his 11th interception of the season.
Detroit (4-7) missed an opportunity to win four straight games for the first time since 2016 and lost a franchise-record sixth straight game on Thanksgiving.
Goff was 23 of 37 for 240 yards with one-yard touchdown pass to St Brown that made it 14-14 late in the first half, and a one-yard touchdown to DJ Chark that pulled the Lions within three points early in third quarter at 22-19.
New York Giants 20–28 Dallas Cowboys
Dak Prescott threw two touchdown passes to tight end Dalton Schultz, Ezekiel Elliott ran for a score and the Dallas Cowboys beat the New York Giants.
Rookie Peyton Hendershot ran for a two-yard TD before directing all three of his fellow tight ends into a giant Salvation Army red kettle for a Whack-AMole celebration.
The victory ended a three-game losing streak on the holiday for the Cowboys (8-3), who moved a game ahead of the Giants in the NFC East while sweeping the season series.
Saquon Barkley was held to 39 yards rushing with a one-yard TD behind a makeshift offensive line missing three starters because of injury in the third loss in the past four games for the Giants (7-4).
Dallas, the NFL leader in sacks coming in, dropped Daniel Jones three times while limiting him to 14 yards rushing after he ran for first downs seven times in the first meeting, a 23-16 Dallas win.
New England Patriots 26-33 Minnesota Vikings
Kirk Cousins threw for 299 yards and three touchdowns, the last a goahead score to Adam Thielen in the fourth quarter to push the Minnesota Vikings past the New England Patriots.
Justin Jefferson had 139 yards and one of the touchdown passes from Cousins, who delivered precisely the clutch performance the Vikings (9-2) needed to bounce back from a blowout loss to Dallas. That gave rookie coach Kevin O’Connell a win over Bill Belichick, who drafted him with the Patriots in 2008.
Mac Jones passed for a career-high 382 yards and two scores to snap a lagging offense to life for the Patriots (6-5), but they ran out of steam down the stretch. Their fourth quarter included two three-and-out punts, a turnover on downs at the Minnesota 39 and a desperation last drive that went nowhere.