In their last loss to the Rams on Sunday, the Bills staged a valiant comeback, but they made a crucial mistake on the final play of the game.

When Los Angeles ended the game with a punt on fourth-and-7 from the Buffalo 42, the Bills did not have 11 players on the field.

In fact, Buffalo had done so via Bill Barnwell of ESPN Only nine players were on the field for the snap.

The Rams called a timeout after lining up to go for it on fourth-and-2 and were assessed a delay-of-game penalty. So the Bills probably had enough time to prepare for the play. But head coach Sean McDermott said after the game that his club had experienced a substation fault.

“Yeah, punt block – we should have been there,” McDermott said in his press conference. “Honestly, we didn’t have enough people on the field to do that. So that’s something – we need to figure that out.

“Just a backup thing on the sideline,” McDermott added. “So that was the information I got because I said counter-sub and went for the block here. And something happened when it came to the substitution.”

So what exactly happened there?

“Yes, it comes down to substitutions, like I said,” McDermott said. “So it’s about communication, about understanding who is in the game and who is available. So we’re going to go back and find out.”

With only seven seconds left, it’s unlikely that the Bills could have actually made a game-changing play at that point to win in the end. But the Rams had a punt blocked earlier in the game that turned into a touchdown, so anything is possible.

Buffalo simply needed the right personnel on the field.