Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four other times. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it isn't a good way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to get up after a sack in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson got up and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are taking it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
