One week ago, I witnessed the Buffalo Bills’ biggest win in years.

My friend Bob L’Heuerux is a Bills fan, and every year, a group of us join him on a pilgrimage to Buffalo to take in a game, lose money at casinos in Niagara Falls, Ontario, and enjoy a guys’ weekend. This year, for the first time in a decade, we managed to make the trip a Bills-Patriots game.

As you know, the Bills won 34-31 on Rian Lindell’s field goal as time expired. Buffalo’s win snapped a 15-game losing streak to the Patriots.

Bills fans celebrated like they won the Super Bowl, and they should have. They have a team that does not quit, and more important, is good. Myself and my friends Jeff and Dave congratulated Bills fans as we left Ralph Wilson Stadium. For us, it was a tough loss to a divisional foe. Not good, but not devastating, either.

For them, it was football nirvana.

It was kind of fun to witness, actually. We in New England have become used to winning, and it’s been years since I left Gillette Stadium dizzy with joy. Honestly, I go into every Patriots game, if not outright expecting them to win, pretty confident that they can. Even against good teams, Patriots losses sneak up on me like a child trying to swipe a cookie.

If that sounds arrogant, that’s because it is. I don’t believe in sports karma, but I do believe in Tom Brady, and I know there will be a day when Brady is not under center and Bill Belichick will not be prowling the sidelines and the Patriots will stink, and I will get my comeuppance. I’ll live with that when the time comes.

As good as the last decade was to the Patriots, it was cruel to the Bills. Buffalo has one winning season in the last 12 years, a 9-7 effort in 2004. The last time they made the playoffs was the 1999 season, losing to Tennessee on the Music City Miracle kick return.

Bob had to think about the next biggest win the Bills have had over the last decade, and all he could come up with was the opening day victory over the Patriots in 2003. It was 31-0, and it’s remembered more for being the game Lawyer Molloy extracted a pound of flesh from the Pats just days after being cut by Bill Belichick than it is for being a Bills win.

This win, though, is the win of promise. Coupled with the previous week’s comeback over the Oakland Raiders, this win gave Bills fans a sense of optimism. Instead of waiting for the other shoe to drop, Bills fans are starting to size up that shoe to kick opponents in the butt.

I learned that as I took heaps of verbal abuse throughout the game.

I didn’t mind the heckling from a few Bills fans. You wear the opponent’s colors to a stadium, it’s to be expected. But hecklers, here’s a free tip: Don’t razz me about my Steve Grogan throwback jersey, then ask me who Grogan is. I know you don’t know the history of one of the toughest quarterbacks to ever take a snap in the NFL, but don’t assume, as one Buffalo fan did, that I’m Grogan.

Harass the name on the front of the jersey, not the name on the back. Or I’ll be forced to remind you that much of the free world is convinced the best running back in your team’s history was tried for murder.

The Patriots-Bills rematch is New Year’s Day, the last day of the regular season. Right now, it looks as if that game will have playoff implications. I hope to see a lot of Bills fans there, decked out in their finest Zubaz pants.

Hopefully, I’ll be able to explain to them who Steve Grogan is as I watch a Patriots victory.

Travis Lazarczyk — 861-9242

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