Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen took consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a sack 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 many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender rose and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously benched for the first series of a loss to New England in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it day by day,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a better week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
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 do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the situation and any circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
