One to remember

At the beginning of the season you would have received large odds in Las Vegas that the Buffalo Bills would be 2-0 to start the season.

You would have received even larger odds that the Bills would have scored 79 points in those two wins. Last year it took until Week 5 before the Bills scored that many points.

But this a very different Bills team than last year's edition - just ask the Oakland Raiders.

On a glorious late summer afternoon at Ralph Wilson Stadium, Darren McFadden and the Raiders rolled up to an easy 21-3 lead at halftime.

But with quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick manning the offence, the Bills truly believed they had a chance to get back in the game and mount a comeback. Needless to say it has been a long time since the Bills had an offence with that kind of confidence. .

The Bills scored 21 unanswered points to start the second half, and then somehow managed to outscore the Raiders 38-35 in a wild display of offensive fireworks.

Late in the fourth quarter Oakland's Jason Campbell nearly sucked the life out of Ralph Wilson Stadium when he squeezed a 50-yard pass into double coverage and hit Denarius Moore for a touchdown that gave the Raiders a 35-31 lead.

Now the pressure was on Fitzpatrick and the Bills' offence to march the ball 80 yards down the field and score the game winning touchdown with time running out.

Well Fitzpatrick did something that Bills fans haven't seen in years. He did march the offence down the field. He did make key throws. He never wavered in his confidence. He looked every bit like a bona fide starting quarterback in the NFL and ended up throwing the game winning touchdown with 14 seconds left to play in the fourth quarter.

Afterwards, Fitzpatrick preferred to give all the credit to his teammates.

"I'm really proud of these guys," Fitzpatrick said. "We lost a lot of these last year, so it's good to be on the other end of it"

David Nelson, a second year receiver who was undrafted out of Florida, caught the game-winning touchdown on fourth-and-one.

Fitzpatrick had a simple message to Nelson in the huddle before the game-winning play: "He was just like, let's go, I'm going to get it to you, make the play. That's really what I did," Nelson said.

Nelson feels this kind of comeback should send a message to teams around the NFL.

"That sends the message to everybody we're not the old Buffalo Bills, we're here to compete, we're here to win and make the playoffs," he said. "We're taking it game by game and we've got 24 hours to celebrate this one and we're on to the next one."

One of the catalysts to the Bills comeback was running back Fred Jackson. While the Raiders' Darren McFadden received all the headlines in the build up to the game, it was Jackson who ended up making a bigger impact.

Jackson became the first member of the Bills to run for 100 yards in each of the first two games of a season since Thurman Thomas in 1991. In the end, Jackson rumbled for 117 yards on 15 carries and scored two touchdowns in the second half.

Jackson kick-started the comeback with an impressive 43-yard touchdown run in the third quarter. As soon as he broke through the line of scrimmage, Jackson said he felt he had a chance to score.

"I knew that once I got past the front seven it was going to be one on one with the safety and I had to make him miss," he said. "I knew if I could get him off balance I could break the tackle and go the distance."

Fitzpatrick believes Jackson's 43-yard run was the tipping point of the game.

"To see him make the run, that got everybody going and we didn't look back from there."

Jackson said there's a feeling in the huddle that with Fitzpatrick running the offence, they always have a chance to win.

"Without a doubt, I think the most important thing is he has confidence in himself and we have confidence in him as well," he said said.

After pulling of the comeback they did and winning such a thrilling game, you would think the locker room would have been a boisterous place. It was anything but.

While pleased with the victory, the Bills were very businesslike afterwards. Jackson said as happy as they were with the win, they know they still have work to do.

"We need keep ourselves out of that situation being down 21-3, that's something we can learn from, we learn from every game," he said.

Even though they gave up 35 points, the Bills defence made a number of key plays in the second half to give Fitzpatrick and the offence a chance to win the game. Linebacker Nick Barnett stripped the ball out of McFadden's hands in the third quarter. Seven plays later the Bills had cut the deficit to four and the comeback was in full swing.

Barnett feels the Bills can take a lot out of this kind of win.

"It wasn't our best effort as a defence, but we got a lot of character out of this game," he said.

Coach Chan Gailey believes this kind of win is crucial to the long-term growth of the Bills as a team

"I think every win helps you," he said. "I don't care what people say. I don't care how you win it. I don't care what the situation is. When you win it helps you as a football team. They start to believe a little more."

With four games still to play against the Patriots and Jets and one against the Eagles, their schedule does them no favours.

Even with a 2-0 record, the playoffs are still a long shot for the Bills. But David Nelson has a valid point: these are not the same "old Buffalo Bills."

The Bills now have the kind of quarterback and the kind of offence that can keep them in games and on days like today, pull off a wild comeback against a solid opponent.

Jim Lang is co-host of Brady and Lang in the morning on Sportsnet Radio the FAN 590 and a columnist for sportsnet.ca.