Very little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four other times. Allen passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just 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’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated 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 contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the situation and any condition, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
