Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback'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 good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach said. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking 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 best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills were unable to make plays down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and any circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
