Little went well for Josh Allen in a frustrating game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen took consecutive sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they pressure our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a couple myself. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second straight game without wideout 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 held out for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
