Okay, Buffalo fans, you can finally exhale.

After a week of buildup that made a Week 2 divisional matchup feel like a Super Bowl, the Bills couldn’t quite get the Patriots, losing 40-32. No, things didn’t go exactly as planned, but take solace: Your team got down early against the mighty New England Patriots, didn’t quit, managed to cut a big lead down just one possession late in the game before the inevitable Tyrod Taylor interception clinched the loss and moved Tom Brady to 24-3 lifetime against the team with the NFL’s longest playoff drought.

While moral victories are for suckers, the Bills can be pleased with their performance in defeat and look at the rest of the season with optimism instead of the usual dread that accompanies autumns in upstate New York. Buffalo, your Bills are for real.

That Week 1 win over the Colts was a tremendous victory for a number of reasons: the defensive dominance, Tyrod Taylor looking like he could soon be a mid-to-top-tier NFL quarterback and the fact that all of it came against the AFC favorite. There was plenty of reason to get hyped for Week 2 against the Pats, despite that aforementioned dominance. The game was at home, Rex Ryan was getting the whole city (and most of the NFL-watching country) hyped up and the Patriots felt as vulnerable as ever (Week 1 win or not) with a subpar rushing attack and the Bills’ fearsome foursome on defense sure to pressure Brady. That Ralph Wilson Stadium sounded like it was hosting an AFC championship with the calendar in September and the thermometer firmly in the mid-60s is a credit to the eternal hope and support of Bills fans.

But New England quieted things down pretty early after the Bills got out to a 7-0 lead, but after building up their own lead to 37-13, silencing that so-called vaunted defense (Brady would end the game with the most passing yards the Bills have ever given up), the Pats slowed down in the fourth as the offense stalled and Buffalo scored touchdowns on three straight possessions. Buffalo had the ball with a chance to tie but the late New England pick sealed its win. And, yes, while the pessimist could say New England took its foot off the gas in the fourth, an optimist would say “since when do the Patriots ever take its foot off the gas, especially against Rex Ryan?”

We learned Sunday that last week wasn’t a fluke: The Bills are a fine football team with a great defensive coach whose teams tend to have trouble offensively. But with that defense, Buffalo is a definite playoff contender. Consider:

• The team’s schedule is favorable, as the team has gotten its toughest games out of the way in the first two weeks of the season.

• The AFC East happens to have the most favorable AFC divisional schedule this year, facing the AFC South, which means games remain with Tennessee, Jacksonville and Houston.

• The NFC matchup is less favorable — the AFC and NFC Easts play in 2015 — but one of the road games is with Washington, the easiest Buffalo could have hoped for. The toughest home game left on the schedule is the Cowboys, who don’t come to Buffalo until after Christmas.

• With new additions on offense such as LeSean McCoy, a young quarterback with room for improvement and a defense that should be stout enough to stop teams that aren’t defending Super Bowl champions, the outlook is rosy.

As for finally getting the best of the Patriots in a meaningful game? Well, there’s always Week 11 — a Monday Night Football showdown in Foxborough.