Little went well for Josh Allen in a tough contest on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense saved us a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Texans. His second one came when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must execute, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
