Little went well for Josh Allen in a disappointing game on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a close loss.
The quarterback took back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a solid job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got find a way, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
“When they pressure our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to preserve our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. Another sack came when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a meeting.
No change. We are taking it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a better 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 give us the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
