Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a solid job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple myself. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup without 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 held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
No change. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
