Little clicked for Josh Allen in a disappointing game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they pressure our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple myself. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
