Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a close defeat.
Allen endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defense saved us a few instances. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for Allen to get anything going on a night he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. Allen threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a few personally. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
