Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise 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 in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to top the Texans. His second one came when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the first series of a loss to New England in Week 5 after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the players that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
