Very little went right for Josh Allen in a disappointing game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen took consecutive sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We’ve got find a way, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was sacked a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they hit our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it’s not a smart way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was slow to get up 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 hit so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously held out for the first series of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
No change. We’re just taking it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills were unable to execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
