KANSAS CITY, Mo. — You never really know what goes into holding onto 1 inch.

If the Kansas City Chiefs did the big-picture math — pored over every decision, dissected every right or wrong move, explored the missteps of everyone else along the way — the tapestry of events leading up to one moment and 1 inch might seem infinite.

You hire head coach Andy Reid four days off his firing by the Philadelphia Eagles. You draft Patrick Mahomes and inexplicably sit him for his rookie season. You pay Chris Jones. You don’t pay Tyreek Hill. You suffer bitter losses to two different versions of Tom Brady and then steel yourself in defeat. You get rid of Kareem Hunt, but then reclaim him from his couch years later. You swap out an assembly line of players, coaches and executives over the years, holding back the tide of other franchises trying to raid and replicate your success. You finesse arguably your biggest NFL rival — the Buffalo Bills — into pivotal draft trades, then use the pieces gained to undercut them in the most torturous of moments.

You are loved. And then you are hated.

After all that, you hold that inch … and it becomes the bridge that takes you one step closer to NFL immortality.

This is what the Chiefs will be when they wake up Monday. AFC champions for the third straight season — but now armed with the opportunity to win their third straight Super Bowl, which is a feat that has never been accomplished since the league merger created the modern-day NFL. Not by the other eight teams that managed to win back-to-back titles during the Super Bowl era. And perhaps more importantly, not by Brady and the New England Patriots, who represent the dynasty of all dynasties with their six Super Bowls in 17 years. This is the kind of rare air the Chiefs find themselves in for the next two weeks.

And they set the stage with a win over Buffalo that might have been the perfect microcosm of this season, which has unfolded like a speeding car barely catching the last flicker of a yellow light while passing through one intersection after another. One near miss here. One close call there. A handful of defeats tipping into victories on timing, execution, luck, talent, boldness or occasional controversy. All were on display Sunday, threading a needle that produced a 32-29 win over the Bills — thanks in large part to a fourth quarter (and fourth down) defensive stand that saw the Chiefs hold Buffalo 1 inch short of a first down.

It was a moment that would tip a 22-21 Bills lead onto its side, sliding momentum behind the Chiefs, who took the ball over at their 41-yard line and swept down the field for a touchdown in only five plays. One 2-point conversion later, Kansas City would hold onto a 29-22 lead. There would be scores traded in the ensuing minutes, with the Bills tying it 29-29 and the Chiefs taking the lead back with a field goal. All of it setting up an immaculate corner blitz by Kansas City defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo, who hurried Bills quarterback Josh Allen into an awkward, looping back-foot throw that went through the arms of tight end Dalton Kincaid.

In reality, it was a game that could have swung in any number of moments, both early and late. But it will be remembered most for the first down that officials determined Allen didn’t get on that quarterback sneak in the fourth quarter. For many Bills fans, it will forever stand as a botched officiating moment that appeared wrong upon video replay. And for many Chiefs fans, it will simply be another moment in which Kansas City earned the tiniest bit of real estate that produced a win. For the scorned Bills faithful, it will produce a chorus of “to hell with the officials.” But for the victorious Chiefs, that will be met with a resounding reply: “to hell with everyone, we’ve got a Super Bowl to win.”

“This came right down to an inch,” Chiefs head coach Andy Reid said Sunday night. “That’s what the stop was.”

“It looked like he got to [the first down],” Bills head coach Sean McDermott surmised. “That’s all I can say.”

Somewhere in between these two, Al Pacino’s Game of Inches speech in "Any Given Sunday" was crying out from 1999: “You find out that life is just a game of inches. So is football.”

Whether the Bills actually got that inch Sunday is anyone’s guess. But it most certainly will be another captive moment of bitterness in this rivalry, shackled to the “13 seconds” loss and an 0-4 postseason record dividing Mahomes and Allen that keeps getting worse. Whether it’s an inch, 13 seconds or four straight losses, they’re all a collection of increments in an ongoing marathon of Buffalo Bills pain.

You could see it in the face of Bills quarterback Josh Allen, whose thousand-yard-stare postgame news conferences have become the norm after falling to Kansas City. All illustrating a collection of finite playoff endings followed by seemingly infinite offseasons of what now? It's a brand of football cruelty familiar to 31 franchises that fail every single season until they finally don’t.

The Chiefs have been there, too. Just a lot less since finding their way to Reid, Mahomes and Spagnuolo and a churning cast of so many others. They've all come together to achieve more than any of them could have collectively imagined. First trailing the greatness of the Patriots and Brady — but now seemingly hunting it. One win away from a Super Bowl three-peat that can move the dynasty conversation from “can they match it?” to “how much could they exceed it?”

One little inch on Sunday, one big conversation Monday and beyond.

Asked Sunday night what he had dreamed of when Reid took over the Chiefs, team owner Clark Hunt’s aspirations sounded remarkably modest in the face of what has unfolded over the past decade.

“The dream was to win one Lamar Hunt Trophy [as winners of the AFC] and win our second Lombardi Trophy,” Hunt said. “The great news is, nobody was satisfied with that.”

This is how one title became two for the Chiefs, then two became three in five years. Now, with Reid and Mahomes together, it’s simply more. Whether by an inch or a mile, speeding through green lights or close-call yellows, the Chiefs are moving forward.

The next destination is three-peat immortality. And it’s suddenly more reachable than ever.