Little went well for Josh Allen in a tough game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they hit our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to keep our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a couple myself. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half sacks to top the Texans. Another sack came when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We are taking it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and 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 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.”
