Buffalo was favored by roughly four touchdowns, a spread near 28 points, and won by three.
It was not all bad. Buffalo put up season highs of 442 total yards and 302 rushing yards and converted 10 of 19 third downs against Robert Morris. The problem was giving it back. There were three turnovers, two Jason Wright interceptions and a lost fumble on a sack that Robert Morris returned for a touchdown. Buffalo beat Robert Morris 31-28 in Week 4.
That is the team walking into the MAC opener at home Saturday against Western Michigan, 1 p.m. ET on ESPN+. The model gives Buffalo a 34% chance.
The pass rush has to show up eventually
Brian Dougherty was promoted to defensive coordinator after two seasons coaching Buffalo's safeties and nickels, and the program framed the move as continuity in the existing system rather than a reset. What changed underneath him was the personnel. Buffalo added transfer linebackers Zach Bergmann and Joey Cheshire, who recorded 100 and 73 tackles respectively at their prior schools, along with transfer defensive linemen Caleb Oliver (7 tackles for loss, 2.5 sacks at Wofford) and Sedrick Vessah (13 tackles for loss, 7 sacks at California PA) in 2025. The bet was that lower-division production would translate quickly. Four games in, it hasn't shown up in the box score. Against an FCS team Buffalo was favored to beat by four touchdowns, the Bulls recorded no sacks and forced no turnovers while allowing 316 yards, including a 50-yard touchdown run by the Robert Morris quarterback and a 32-yard touchdown pass that made the last two minutes uncomfortable.
Western Michigan is close to the worst possible opponent for a front seven in that condition. The 2025 Broncos averaged 204.2 rushing yards to 138.5 passing yards per game on their way to the title. An offense that wants to stay on the ground, shorten the game, and make you win with your defensive line. If Buffalo's ends can't make a tackle for loss and the linebackers can't knock a ball loose, Western Michigan will grind out a comfortable afternoon regardless of what the Bulls do offensively.
So the thing to watch on Saturday is simple and unglamorous. It is first-down runs. Whether Bergmann and Cheshire are meeting backs at the line or two yards downfield will tell you within a quarter whether this defense has found anything.
Why the Bulls might have a puncher's chance
MAC coaches picked Western Michigan first in the preseason poll with 138 points and nine first-place votes, and gave the Broncos nine of 13 votes to win the title game. Those same coaches picked Buffalo sixth in the 13-team league with 81 points. Nobody expects this.
But the schedule was always going to front-load the hard part. Buffalo opened with UAlbany at home, went to FIU and Penn State, hosted Robert Morris, and now starts conference play with the defending champion followed by a trip to Toledo. After that the slate softens considerably. UMass and Bowling Green at home, with the model liking Buffalo in both. A split of the next two would be a genuinely good start. Losing both and still being 2-4 with the easier stretch ahead is survivable. Getting one here would be the kind of result that changes the season's arithmetic in a hurry.
And these programs have history that suggests scoreboards can get strange. Western Michigan beat Buffalo 71-68 in seven overtimes in 2017, 139 combined points, the highest-scoring game in FBS history, with Drew Anderson throwing for 595 yards and seven touchdowns in the loss. The most recent meeting, in 2024 at Buffalo, went 48-41 to the Broncos. Buffalo has scored on Western Michigan before. Stopping them has been the harder half.
One more thing worth tracking before kickoff. Elijah Holmes missed a second straight game with a knee injury and is targeting a return this week against Western Michigan, though no firm timeline has been confirmed. Wright just ran for 95 yards, but he also lost a fumble on a sack that Robert Morris returned for a touchdown. If the defense can't get stops, Buffalo needs to outscore a team that wants to play keep-away, and a healthy Holmes gives Pete Lembo a second option for that kind of game. Watch the pregame warmups.
A Buffalo win pushes the Bulls' MAC title-game odds to roughly 25%. A loss drops them to about 3%. Those are two very different Octobers, decided in one afternoon.
Toledo at Ball State: root for Ball State
Toledo is the other team the Bulls have to get past, and Buffalo visits them next week. An upset here would put a conference loss on one of the MAC's projected top teams and lift Buffalo's title-game odds by about 2.8 percentage points.
Ball State gets it done about 6% of the time. Kickoff is 2 p.m. ET on ESPN+, an hour after Buffalo's game starts. Whatever the Cardinals manage, the Bulls get their own crack at Toledo next Saturday.
Full numbers are in the interactive guide, and the model is explained on the methodology page.