Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen took consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following 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 said. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We must find a way, 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 other times. Allen passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat 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 remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. 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 Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and whatever condition, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
