Very little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a close loss.
The quarterback endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen stated. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a good way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a loss to New England in the fifth week after also being late for a meeting.
No change. We are approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
