Little clicked for Josh Allen in a frustrating contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay last week.
“When they hit our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to preserve our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game without receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the first series of a loss to New England in the fifth week after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that provide the best chance.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
