Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction 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 possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers 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 is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a good way to preserve our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a few personally. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender rose and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We are approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that provide the best chance.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
