Returning to old home, Stefon Diggs was the pivotal Patriot

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — It should have appeared so acquainted, so achingly acquainted, to the Payments followers that packed Highmark Stadium to the brim Sunday night time for his or her undefeated group’s prime-time matchup with the Patriots.

There was Stefon Diggs, on the market on that acquainted turf, making crucial play after crucial play, as probably the most trusted goal for a supremely proficient younger quarterback.

However these are completely different occasions. Diggs, who spent 4 seasons with the Payments, catching over 100 passes for greater than 1,000 yards in each considered one of them whereas constructing an enviable on-field rapport with quarterback Josh Allen, is now in his first season as a Patriot.

And within the stadium he used to name his soccer dwelling, he confirmed off his connection together with his new quarterback, Drake Maye, whose ascendance to excellence may simply be taking place quicker than Allen’s did.

Per week after his most interesting sport as a Patriot, with six catches for 101 yards in a 42-13 rout of the Panthers, Diggs relegated that efficiency to distant runner-up standing.

Within the Patriots’ stirring 23-20 victory, which despatched a message to remainder of the AFC and a nationwide viewers on NBC’s “Sunday Evening Soccer” that they’re not anybody’s punch line or pushover, Diggs was each important and sensational, ending with 10 catches on 12 targets for 146 yards.

“I’m simply so excited,” Diggs instructed SNF reporter Melissa Stark after the sport. “Clearly this sport has a manner of instructing you quite a lot of issues. I instructed everybody to start with of the sport, ‘Band collectively. Lean in your brother.’ I’m simply so pleased with these guys. [Drake’s] first time in prime time, I can’t inform … I’m simply completely satisfied to be part of this factor.”

Diggs’s first catch, a 15-yarder, got here on the Patriots’ first play from scrimmage. The ultimate seven got here within the second half — discuss leaning on somebody — and a minimum of three have to be thought of among the many most necessary performs within the Patriots’ win.

Diggs’s first immense play got here on the Patriots’ first possession of the second half. The Payments, after a mistake-plagued first half, charged out after the break to take a 10-6 lead on Allen’s 6-yard landing go to Curtis Samuel.

It was truthful to wonder if the Payments, who entered the sport because the NFL’s lone unbeaten after the Eagles misplaced to the Broncos earlier Sunday, would take command from there.

However Maye (22 of 30, 273 yards, no TDs nor INTs whereas below frequent siege) led the Patriots on a 5-play, 74-yard landing drive to retake the lead. It started with a Diggs’ seize for 16 yards to the Patriots’ 42-yard line.

Rhamondre Stevenson capped the march with 4-yard landing, however that run was arrange the earlier play. With 7:21 left within the third quarter and the Patriots dealing with second-and-9 from the Buffalo 36, Maye rolled proper (sure, below siege) and scanned downfield. On the identical time, Diggs altered his route when he noticed his quarterback was fleeing hazard, turning and heading up subject.

It was the precisely the sort of learn a wise veteran receiver is meant to make, and a sign that his chemistry with Maye is already at a excessive stage. The outcome: a 32-yard acquire.

On the Patriots’ first possession of the fourth quarter, Diggs broke off a 30-yarder — catching a brief go on second-and-11 and weaving via an assortment of lunging Payments defenders, lastly getting hauled down on the Buffalo 6. After a run that misplaced a yard, Stevenson blasted in from the 7 for his second landing to place the Patriots up, 20-10.

Arguably Diggs’s most necessary catch was nonetheless to come back. The Payments lower the Patriots result in 20-17 on Allen’s 2-yard landing go to Keon Coleman at 7:37 of the fourth, then tied the sport on Matt Prater’s 45-yard subject objective with 2:17 left.

Highmark Stadium was shaking to its concrete and metal bones, the momentum had shifted with the Payments’ 10 unanswered factors, and the Patriots had been dealing with a stress take a look at of their very own.

So what did they do? Easy. The obtained what can be the profitable drive began in probably the most safe manner attainable: with a completion to Diggs, in fact.

However the diploma of issue couldn’t have been a lot harder. Maye, chased proper and shortly clutched by Payments defensive sort out DaQuan Jones, unloaded the ball in Diggs’s course simply as he was about to be yanked to the turf.

Diggs caught the sinking go, turned upfield, made a jitterbug faux after which one other, and picked up 12 yards to the New England 41. It wasn’t the most important gainer of the drive — that was a 19-yarder to Kayshon Boutte that introduced the Patriots to the Buffalo 39 — nevertheless it was the stabilizer, turning what might have been a damaging play into a primary down. It set the tone for a drive that concluded with Andy Borregales’s profitable 51-yard subject objective.

The sport might need been revenge for Diggs, who felt just like the Payments — who traded him to Houston earlier than the 2024 season — not thought of him important to their offense.

It might need been redemption, too. For 4 seasons, he gave Josh Allen a receiver to lean on. Now he’s doing the identical for Drake Maye — by no means extra so than he did Sunday night time in his outdated neighborhood.