Very little went well for Josh Allen in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen took back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy 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.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one came when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second straight game without receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills were unable to execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever situation and whatever condition, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
