A couple of Bills traditions made their way across the parking lot to the team’s new home as Buffalo opened Highmark Stadium with a win over the Lions on “Thursday Night Football.”
During the fourth quarter of the Bills’ first win at their new home (a 41-31 win over the Lions), The Killers’ hit song “Mr. Brightside” blared through the stadium as fans and players alike were seen rocking out.
In one video posted on social media, offensive linemen Dion Dawkins and Connor McGovern could be seen jumping around, dancing and singing while the song played.
As the camera panned out, the entire stadium appeared to be singing along as the song hit the chorus.
Playing the song during Bills wins — and the fans singing along — has become a newer tradition in Western New York and one that clearly made it from the team’s old home, which is in the process of being demolished.
The Bills’ connection to the popular song dates back to a December 2023 game against the Cowboys, when tight ends Dalton Kincaid and Dawson Knox both wanted to hear it during the fourth quarter of that contest, according to WROC.
The request found its way to Brian Haberkorn, the Bills’ director of game presentation, who remembered thinking, “OK, we can do that.”
“So we play ‘Mr. Brightside’. Great fan reaction and great reaction from the players, too. I thought after the game, if the players are that energized to hear the song, let’s enhance it a little bit,” he told the outlet in 2025.
Since then it has evolved into something of a tradition for the Bills.
Haberkorn’s only criteria when it’s played, he explained to WROC, was that it’s always happens in the fourth quarter.
“It’s when I feel like that one little burst of energy is going to get the team going, going to get the fans going, and it’s going to carry us over the top for the rest of the game,” he said.
“Mr. Brightside” wasn’t the only tradition that made its way to the stadium, with the table-breaking trend featured prominently.
Former Bills quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick jumped through a table during the “Thursday Night Football” broadcast on Prime Video, and the stadium designers even built a giant broken table into the design of Highmark Stadium to pay homage to the tradition.
