Very little went right for Josh Allen in a frustrating game on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback endured consecutive sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense saved us a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple personally. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender rose and pursued him across the field 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 wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
No change. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we’ve got perform, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
