Bills vs. Patriots Ratings Success Sparked by Damar Hamlin Recovery, Hines' TDs

The Bills-Patriots regular-season finale was the most-watched game of the NFL's Week 18 slate.

In addition to being one of the NFL’s most potent and well-balanced teams, the Buffalo Bills are also quite a hit with viewers.

With a capacity crowd on hand at Highmark Stadium, legions of Bills Mafia members tuned-in to watch their beloved Bills secure the No. 2 seed in the AFC playoff standings, as they dispatched their division-rival New England Patriots 35-23 on Sunday afternoon.

The game, broadcast on CBS, helped pace an 11.8 average rating and 22.73 million viewers for the first half of the network’s Week 18 NFL doubleheader. As expected, the Pats-Bills tilt was the most-watched game of Week 18, as well as garnering the highest ratings and viewership of the season for an early (1 p.m. ET) window. Viewership was also the highest for CBS in the final week of an NFL season since 2011, in which the league drew approximately 27 million viewers.

The emotionally-charged Patriots-Bills game, which marked Buffalo’s first game since safety Damar Hamlin suffered an on-field cardiac arrest just six days earlier, opened with the Bills scoring on the first play of the game – the likes of which could only be believed on the pages of a Hollywood script.

After receiving Patriots’ kicker Nick Folk’s opening offering at the team’s own 4-yard line, running back/return specialist Nyheim Hines returned the ball 96 yards for the touchdown. The score gave the Bills a 7-0 lead with only 14 seconds removed from the game clock.

“It was spiritual,” Hines said after the game. “I felt like he [Damar Hamlin] was out there with us.”

However, Hines was not done. In the third quarter he returned a kickoff 101 yards for a touchdown to give the Bills a 21-17 lead. In doing so, he became the 11th player in NFL history with two kick return touchdowns in the same game and the first since Leon Washington did so for the Seattle Seahawks in 2010. Hines also became the first NFL player in history to have a game with two punt-return touchdowns and a game with two kickoff-return touchdowns in his career.

Hines’ storybooks start prominently placed him in the Bills’ record books, as well. The ex-Indianapolis Colt was the first player in franchise history to return two kickoffs for touchdowns in the same game, while also becoming the first Bill to log 235 kick return yards in a single game as well.

With the win, the Bills improved to 13-3 in the regular season, matching a franchise-best mark. However, one would be remiss by failing to mention the spiritual motivation provided to the team by taking the field for the first time since Hamlin’s startling collapse during the first quarter of Buffalo’s Week 17 matchup against the Cincinnati Bengals.

Despite having been resuscitated twice due to cardiac arrest, Hamlin is on the road to a remarkable recovery. In a league-wide demonstration of solidarity, the Patriots and Bills will join all teams showing their love and support for Hamlin through pregame activities, as well as on-field apparel and markings bearing his number 3, along with the words “Love For Damar.” Hamlin has since been released from the University of Cincinnati Medical Center and is continuing his treatment back in Buffalo.

In the meantime, the Bills are preparing to host the Miami Dolphins on Sunday at Highmark Stadium for Wild Card Weekend. Kickoff is set for 1.p.m ET. 

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Follow Mike D’Abate on Twitter @mdabateNFL

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