Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they pressure our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a smart way to keep our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the first half. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple myself. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender rose and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being delayed for a team session.
No change. We’re just approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re handling it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills were unable to execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
