Very little clicked for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the team's final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they pressure our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a safe 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 sluggish to get up after a sack in the first half. 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 said. “I encountered a couple personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Texans. His second one came 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 force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game without receiver Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a team session.
No change. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
