Little went right for Josh Allen in a frustrating contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and pressured four other times. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. His second one came when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender got up and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy 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 also being late for a team session.
No change. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we’ve got perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
