Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
Allen took consecutive sacks on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a solid job of hanging tough 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 brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
“When they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a good way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a couple myself. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one came when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the first series of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
No change. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott 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 went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
