Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 defeat.
The quarterback took back-to-back sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen said. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they hit our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott said. “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 preserve our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple myself. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier held out for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are taking it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
