Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they hit our QB a dozen 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 play and it’s not a smart way to keep our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated 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 contacted so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
No change. We are approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a better week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we must execute, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
