For years, opposing running backs gashed the Jets’ front seven on a weekly basis, and few humbled them worse than Buffalo’s Travis Henry. But in yesterday’s 16-14 win over Buffalo, Gang Green showed the days of running amok on their defense are long gone.
The Jets held the Pro Bowl back, who injured his ankle on the Bills opening drive, to 33 yards on a dozen painful carries. Half of those rushes went for no gain or negative yards, and every single one of them was contested tooth and nail, with Gang Green dominating him so thoroughly, the Bills had to shelve their Pro Bowl back in the second half.
“Number 20 can run. We haven’t stopped him yet. We can’t tackle the guy. He knocks us over like bowling pins. He’s a good runner. He’s a heck of a football player,” coach Herm Edwards had said Wednesday of the player the Jets knew would decide yesterday’s contest.
Almost to a man, the Jets had said they needed to contain Henry to stay undefeated. Yesterday, they didn’t contain him: They erased him altogether, punishing the 215-pound power back the way he used to punish them.
The first five times Henry had faced the Jets, he’d carried 118 times for 567 yards, scored five times and averaged 113.4 yards per game. He gouged them for a career-high 169 yards in a 16-7 Bills win last December, despite playing with a broken bone in his right leg and torn rib cartilage.
But that was against the old Jets, not the new and improved version.
Those teams had slow, aged linebackers that couldn’t purse and didn’t shed blocks. Last year, they finished 28th in the NFL in run defense, and they spent much of their offseason addressing that problem. They came into yesterday allowing just 107 rushing yards – 13th in the NFL – and performed even better.
They swarmed to meet Henry faster than the fighter jets that did a flyby over the Meadowlands before the game. He gained just 29 first-half yards on 10 carries.
And it wasn’t just the turbocharged linebacking corps – led by Jonathan Vilma – that attacked him. The line got great penetration into the backfield, and brought him down on half of his first-half carries.
So ineffective was the Pro Bowler that Bills coach Mike Mularkey went with Wills McGahee in the second half. McGahee got six third-quarter carries, while Henry got just two. And in the fourth quarter, Henry didn’t get a single carry.
And by taking away Henry, rookie coordinator Donnie Henderson’s defense effectively took away Buffalo’s offense.
