FOXBORO -- There's a scene in Hoosiers, at a pep rally in the Hickory High gymnasium, where the crowd is clamoring for star sharpshooter Jimmy Chitwood, who has decided not to play basketball for new coach Norman Dale.

``We want Jimmy! We want Jimmy!'' they chant.

Then Dale steps to the microphone and tells the fans they should cheer Hickory for who they are, not who they are not.

``This,'' he says, turning toward his small squad, ``is your team.''

Patriots fans weren't cheering when their team left the field after a first half in which Tom Brady had completed just 3 of 11 passes, for only 30 yards, and had been sacked three times -- the first coming just 12 seconds into the game and resulting in a fumble that the Bills returned for a touchdown on their way to a 17-7 lead.

``I don't think we gave them much reason to cheer,'' Brady said. ``They want to see us do something offensively, put the ball in the end zone, and we turned the ball over, we can't complete a pass. I would be booing, too, if I was them.''

It's likely that most Pats' fans went home happier than Brady, after New England pulled out a 19-17 victory thanks largely to a defense that pitched a second-half shutout that included a fourth-and-a-foot stuffing of the Bills seven yards from the goal line on the first possession of the second half, and a sack of Buffalo quarterback J.P. Losman in the fourth quarter for a safety and the winning points.

``It's certainly better to win than lose,'' said Brady, ``but, at the same time, we knew we didn't play very well.''

There were no chants of ``We want Deion! We want Deion!'' emanating from the Gillette Stadium stands, but there may be soon, because, without a deep threat like holdout wideout Deion Branch, the Patriots appear to be in deep trouble.

In his absence, Brady, the finest -- sorry, Peyton -- quarterback in the NFL, completed the not-so-grand total of 11 passes yesterday afternoon against the Bills, who are not remotely close to being the finest team in the AFC East.

Only four of those completions went to his wideouts, for a mere 51 yards. That averages out to 17 yards per wide receiver dressed for the season-opening game. Except that one of those wide receivers was Bam Childress, who was on the practice squad as recently as Saturday morning, and did not catch a pass yesterday.

Troy Brown, who turned 35 in July, caught a 9-yard touchdown pass in the first quarter, and another 9-yarder in the third quarter. Reche Caldwell, who caught 47 passes in four years for San Diego before signing with New England as a free agent in March, had two receptions, including a 24-yarder in the fourth quarter.

The longest ball completed by Brady went to tight end Ben Watson, who hauled in a 35-yarder down the middle on third down in the Pats' third-quarter touchdown drive. Daniel Graham, another tight end, gained 23 yards on his only catch of the day.

Not counting the season-ending game last year against the Dolphins, when he played only the first quarter, the last time Brady completed fewer passes was in December 2004, at Cleveland, when he was 11-for-20. But that was a game in which Bethel Johnson returned the opening kickoff for a TD, Corey Dillon ran for 100 yards, and the Patriots cruised to a 42-15 win.

Earlier that season, Brady was just 7-for-19 against Miami in Foxboro, but the Pats won that game, too, 24-10. He was 8-for-21 against the Giants in 2003, but New England also won that one, 17-6.

So maybe they can pull this off. Maybe they can go from an air-it-out team -- Brady has averaged 325 completions in 509 attempts, for 26 TDS, over the past five seasons -- to a grind-it-out team.

The ground game certainly looked good yesterday, with veteran Corey Dillon (73 yards on 16 carries) and rookie Laurence Maroney (17 rushes, 86 yards, with a long of 27) combining for 159 of the team total of 183 -- their highest since that Cleveland game in '04.

But Brady knows that, if he can't stretch opposing defenses, they're going to pack ``the box'' and stuff the run, while also continuing to make it difficult for him to get the ball to a pair of wideouts that doesn't scare anybody -- except, perhaps, Patriots fans worried about their team's playoff chances.

``It was an ugly game,'' Brady said. ``Obviously, we just could never get into a rhythm. I think the defense really played well. We need to play a lot better on offense.''

The offense did have a couple of impressive drives, bouncing right back from that first play fumble-and-touchdown by going 80 yards in 9 plays for the tying TD. And, after the defense stopped Willis McGahee on fourth down in the third quarter, Brady led the offense 93 yards in 12 plays to another score, this one coming on a diving catch in the end zone by running back Kevin Faulk, who'd lined up at wide receiver.

But, while the Pats walked away with a win, nobody -- not the coaches, not the players, and certainly not the fans -- should have left feeling confident of beating the lowly Jets, consensus picks to finish last in the division, next Sunday at the Meadowlands.

Asked why his team had difficulty stretching the Buffalo defense, coach Bill Belichick said: ``Well, they've got good corners, they played a lot of two-deep coverage, and they've got a good pass rush. We tried to let some patterns develop, but Tom either got hit, or the ball was tipped.''

``We need,'' Brady said, when asked about throwing the deep ball, ``to certainly do a better job of making them defend that part of the field. When we drop back and throw, we've got to be more effective. I don't think we threw the ball well at all.

``I certainly hope it's a short-term thing. We have to work hard to make sure this doesn't carry over to next week. The passing game is all about execution. It's about route discipline, it's about protection, it's about good reads and good throws. There just wasn't enough of that today.''

The biggest problem with the Patriots' passing game right now is that they don't have enough wide receivers -- and none who's a threat to go deep. Which could make it hard to go deep into the playoffs. Or perhaps even to get into the playoffs.