Little went right for Josh Allen in a disappointing contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback took consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a smart way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK 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 encountered a couple personally. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Texans. Another sack came when he almost sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender rose and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” the coach said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are handling it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James 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 failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”