Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. Allen passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a few personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half sacks to top the Texans. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” 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 went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we need to find a way, and we didn’t.”
