Very little went well for Josh Allen in a frustrating game on Thursday evening against the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
Allen took back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was sacked a career-high eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of 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’ve got to play better.”
Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. Another sack came when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second straight game without wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo 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 down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
