Little went right for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a close defeat.
The quarterback endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing 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 don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple myself. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender got up and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
