Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win 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 the Bills (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
“When they hit our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the situation and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
