Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh 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 picked off Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
“When they pressure our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it isn't a smart way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I’ve got 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. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson rose and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch 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 also being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
