Very little went right for Josh Allen in a frustrating contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and hit four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after producing six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
“When they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
