Very little went well for Josh Allen in a frustrating game Thursday night against the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Texans. Another sack occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to New England in the fifth week after additionally being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that provide the best chance.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills were unable to make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
