Little went well for Josh Allen in a frustrating game Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. Allen passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a few myself. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. 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 deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that provide the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
