Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a good way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Texans. Another sack occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
