Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they hit our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson got up and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch 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 the Patriots in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We are approaching it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
