Little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening versus the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen took back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defense saved us a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so many times on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple myself. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss 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 pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game without wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must execute, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
