Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest Thursday night versus the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four other times. Allen passed 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 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a sack in the opening two quarters. 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 frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson rose and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 yards and a score.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we need to find a way, and we didn’t.”
