Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game Thursday night versus the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate 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 (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to preserve our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second straight game without receiver Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We’re just taking it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team were unable to execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
