Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen stated. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a career-high eight times and hit four other times. Allen threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after producing six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so many times on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously benched for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
No change. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
