Very little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback endured consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four other times. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
“When they pressure our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to preserve our field general healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. His second one came when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a better week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we must execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
