Bills offense suddenly has spark after fourth-quarter eruption in 31-14 win over Dolphins

Bills offense has spark after beating Miami 34-14

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — Terrell Owens still isn’t sure where he’ll be once his one-year contract with the Buffalo Bills expires this offseason.

One thing is certain: T.O. has a new reason to look forward to what’s left of this year now that interim coach Perry Fewell has provided a spark to a sputtering offense.

“Well, he’s two weeks too late. I’ve been wanting to be aggressive all year,” Owens said with a laugh, assessing Fewell’s impact in the two weeks since taking over after Dick Jauron’s dismissal. “That’s his coaching style. And sometimes you like that in a coach. And obviously, it feeds through him and throughout this team.”

Something’s certainly changed for a Bills offense that shed months of ineptitude by scoring 24 points in the fourth quarter — and 17 in the final 4 minutes — in a 31-14 win over the Miami Dolphins on Sunday.

“How sweet it is, baby,” said Fewell, the defensive coordinator who had previously never been a head coach at any level. “We’ve been talking about finishing. That’s what we did today.”

The win evened Fewell’s record at 1-1 and came in a week in which the Bills tagged former Denver Broncos coach Mike Shanahan as a potential candidate.

Not so fast.

“I’m not going to say that right now,” safety Donte Whitner said when asked if this was a players’ statement favoring Fewell. “But I know we can run a couple off in a row, and then we’ll talk about that.”

The Bills (4-7), who snapped a three-game skid, have little time to enjoy the victory as they prepare to “host” the New York Jets at Toronto on Thursday.

The Dolphins (5-6), meanwhile, suddenly face a must-win challenge next week when they host the AFC East-leading Patriots. This wasn’t the position Miami expected to be in after climbing back into contention by winning five of seven to overcome an 0-3 start.

“Now it’s an uphill battle,” said Ricky Williams, who had 115 yards rushing and scored on a 1-yard plunge. “We were getting ourselves in a really good position for this late-season run. And now we just made our jobs a little more difficult.”

Quarterback Chad Henne unraveled down the stretch, finishing the game with three straight interceptions, the first two of which set up Bills touchdowns. The Dolphins opened themselves up to second-guessing on their first drive, which ended when Williams, on first-and-goal from the 3, took a direct snap, faked a run and then threw an interception.

“Sometimes gimmicks work, and sometimes the execution just isn’t there,” receiver Greg Camarillo said. “And today it wasn’t there.”

The Bills won by overcoming a reputation of folding down the stretch after having been outscored 109-40 in the fourth quarter this season. Then again, they were playing a Dolphins team that’s now allowed an NFL-worst 134 points in the final quarter.

After Fred Jackson scored his first of two touchdowns on a 3-yard run to tie it at 14, the Bills took the lead for good with 3:35 left, when Rian Lindell hit a career-best 56-yard field goal.

Henne then threw an interception, which the Bills quickly turned into a 10-point lead when Ryan Fitzpatrick hit Owens for a 51-yard touchdown down the right sideline.

When Jackson completed the rout by scoring on a 7-yard run, the three touchdowns the Bills produced in the final 14 minutes matched the number they scored in their previous seven home games, including a 16-3 loss to the Dolphins at Toronto last December.

Getting Owens involved has made a huge impact since Fewell, upon taking over, benched starter Trent Edwards and replaced him with Fitzpatrick.

After Owens was limited to 366 yards receiving in his first nine games under Jauron, he now has 293 in his past two after a 96-yard outing against Miami, which followed up a 197-yard, one-touchdown performance in a 18-15 loss at Jacksonville.

“Well, yeah, I think we were hinting at that last week, and we just came up a little bit short,” Owens said, referring to the offense’s potential. “But we were very confident even though we lost. … We prepared hard and it showed out there.”

Fitzpatrick, who scored on a 31-yard run, finished 17 of 26 for 246 yards.