Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen took consecutive sacks on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and pressured four other times. Allen passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender rose and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the team were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”