Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game Thursday night versus the Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen took consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen stated. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 sacks to lead the Texans. Another sack came when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson got up and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a team session.
No change. We’re just taking it day by day,” the coach said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
