{"id":3338,"date":"2026-01-18T13:33:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T05:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/2026\/01\/18\/irate-bills-coach-sean-mcdermott-reacts-to-broncos-controversial-ot-inning\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T15:09:22","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T07:09:22","slug":"irate-bills-coach-sean-mcdermott-reacts-to-broncos-controversial-ot-inning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/2026\/01\/18\/irate-bills-coach-sean-mcdermott-reacts-to-broncos-controversial-ot-inning\/","title":{"rendered":"Irate Bills coach Sean McDermott reacts to Broncos’ controversial OT inning"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The Buffalo Bills suffered yet another heartbreaking playoff loss on Saturday, and to add to the pain, this loss came with some controversy. When Denver won 33-30 in overtime, the Broncos’ game-winning drive was set up by an interception that shouldn’t have counted, according to Bills coach Sean McDermott. <\/p>\n

With less than eight minutes left in overtime, the Bills were facing third-and-11 from their own 36-yard line, so Josh Allen decided to throw a deep pass to Bradin Cooks. On the play, Cooks appeared to catch the ball, but after it rolled to the ground, it was Ja’Quan McMillian who came up with it. <\/p>\n

If Cooks had been in possession of the ball when his knee hit the ground, the game would have been over, but the officials ruled that Cooks did not catch the ball when he hit the ground so the ball was still alive when McMillian snapped it. <\/p>\n

After the game, McDermott was asked about the game and was upset for two reasons. For one thing, he didn’t feel like the management team took enough time to review the game. <\/p>\n

“It’s hard for me to — and I’ve had the opportunity to watch it — it’s hard for me to understand why you’re being governed the way you are,” McDermott said. “If it’s ruled that way, then why wasn’t it slowed down to make sure we had this right. That would have made a lot of sense to me, to make sure we had this right, because that’s an important play in the game. We have the ball at the 20 and we might be kicking a game-winning field goal right there, so I’ll leave it at that.”<\/p>\n

An angry McDermott had more to say after giving his initial response. <\/p>\n

“I’m saying it because I represent Nathi,” said the Bills coach. “I’m representing us. What’s happening, it shouldn’t go down like that, in my estimation. These guys spent three hours playing football, spilling their guts. That they don’t even say, ‘Hey, let’s handle this thing.’ That’s where I was tortured.”<\/p>\n

McDermott was then asked if he thought the game should have been ruled a no-go and he didn’t hide his opinion. <\/p>\n

“In my eyes it was, but even if it wasn’t the case, the players owe, to me, ‘Well, let’s stop it, delay it, put a referee and give him a chance to look at the monitor,” said McDermott. <\/p>\n

After the press conference, the Bills coach was interviewed again in the pool report and after thinking about the play, he emphasized even more that the officials made the wrong call on the field. <\/p>\n

“That game is not even close,” McDermott said, via WGR-550 in Buffalo. “That’s a catch all the way. I sat in my locker and looked at it 20 times, and nobody can convince me that that ball wasn’t caught and owned by Buffalo. I just don’t know how the NFL gave it, especially, the way it did. I think the players and the fans deserve an explanation.”<\/p>\n

After the game, referee Carl Cheffers gave that explanation when asked why the game was called off. <\/p>\n

“The receiver has to complete the catch process,” Cheffers said in the pool report. “He was going down as part of the catch and failed to handle the ball as he hit the ground. The linebacker got it at that point. The linebacker completed the catch, so the linebacker gets the ball.”<\/p>\n

McDermott has probably never asked officials to make a phone call, but he felt it was necessary in this case. <\/p>\n

“I’m speaking out because I feel strongly that that was a catch and that the ball should have belonged to Buffalo,” McDermott said. “I will not agree with their assessment regarding the exchange of property, whatever the statement was. I do not accept that. We will not just sit here and take it, what I say. We will not sit here and take it. I am tired of it.”<\/p>\n

The controversial upset was one of five turnovers the Bills made in the game. Allen was responsible for four of them with two interceptions and two fumbles. <\/p>\n

McMillian’s pick created more controversy: The Broncos ended up driving 75 yards for their game-winning field goal, but 47 yards of that total came from pass interference penalties. <\/p>\n

The Bills have had to deal with the worst loss in franchise history and this is one that will stick with them for a while. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Buffalo Bills suffered yet another heartbreaking playoff loss on Saturday, and to add to the pain, this loss came with some controversy. When Denver won 33-30 in overtime, the Broncos’ game-winning drive was set up by an interception that shouldn’t have counted, according to Bills coach Sean McDermott. With less than eight minutes left …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3339,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-breaking-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3338"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3338\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3340,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3338\/revisions\/3340"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}