Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen took consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. 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 on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Texans. Another sack occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender got up and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second straight game without wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
No change. We are approaching it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking 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.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
