Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the team's final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen stated. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defense saved us a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was sacked a career-high eight times and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender rose and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” the coach said. “I felt 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 give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
