Little went well for Josh Allen in a tough game on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for Allen to get anything going on a night he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the first half. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple personally. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
