Very little went right for Josh Allen in a disappointing game on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a close loss.
The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
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 passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to top the Texans. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender got up and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second straight game without receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the first series of a loss to New England in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a team session.
No change. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that provide the best chance.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
