Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple myself. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills were unable to make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we must execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
