Very little went well for Josh Allen in a tough contest on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback endured consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough 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 passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t make plays down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
