Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
The quarterback endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second straight game without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a team session.
No change. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and any circumstance, we need to find a way, and we didn’t.”
