Very little went right for Josh Allen in a tough game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had 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 bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was difficult for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple myself. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and chased 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 straight game absent wideout Keon 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 loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
