Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “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 we didn’t.”
Proved tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four other times. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a few personally. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re handling it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that provide the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
