During a physically and mentally tough game for the Giants and Bills, tensions were high — and so were the kicks.
NBC cameras on Sunday caught a scuffle between a grounded Kayvon Thibodeaux and towering Buffalo players who fell victim to the Giants linebacker’s martial arts-like kicks.
At the brunt of the kicks was Bills offensive tackle Dion Dawkins, who appeared to take one kick below the belt.
This quickly escalated to other offensive linemen pushing and shoving, redirecting the public’s attention away from Thibodeaux’s kicking fest.
Dexter Lawrence shoved Bills offensive tackle Spencer Brown to the ground. Leonard Williams and Bobby Okereke came over and Williams knocked Brown back to the turf.
Even Buffalo quarterback Josh Allen got involved in the fight in the end zone, throwing a shoulder into Okereke.
Offsetting penalties were administered for both teams.
Williams and Thibodeaux were both given unnecessary roughness penalties for the Giants while Dawkins was given the flag on the Bills.
Emotions ran heavy for both teams as the game came down to the wire.
For the Bills, running back Damien Harris went down in the second quarter and had to be taken off the field in an ambulance. He has full movement in his body.
The scene hit home for Damar Hamlin, who was also taken off in an ambulance after suffering cardiac arrest in January.
Hamlin was emotional on the bench watching Harris get tended to.
As for the Giants, they failed to score one yard away from the end zone — twice.
Filling in for an injured Daniel Jones, backup quarterback Tyrod Taylor helped take the Giants to the 1-yard line with a first-and-goal with 14 seconds left in the second quarter and no timeouts remaining.
However, running back Saquon Barkley got stuffed by the Bills defense.
Taylor tried to hurry his team into formation to get off one final play, but the clock expired before the ball could be snapped.
That set the tone for the rest of the game.
“It came down to a yard,” Giants head coach Brian Daboll said. “We came up a yard short.”
