Little went well for Josh Allen in a disappointing game Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh 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, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four other times. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We are taking it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and whatever condition, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
