Little went well for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a close defeat.
The quarterback endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a few personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half sacks to top the Texans. His second one occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we are 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.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the team were unable to execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and any circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
