Very little clicked for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen took consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
It was difficult for the signal-caller to establish rhythm 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 win over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to keep our field general healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game without receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed 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 situation and whatever circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
