Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen took consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
“When they hit our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to play and it isn't a smart 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 said he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a few personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Texans. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to New England in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re handling 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 best chance.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the team were unable to execute in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
