Little went well for Josh Allen in a tough game Thursday night against the Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
It was difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
“When they hit our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a few personally. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
