Little went well for Josh Allen in a tough game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback endured consecutive sacks on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle 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 hit so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack came when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender rose and pursued 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 absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the first series of a loss to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
