Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they hit our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it isn't a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
