Little went right for Josh Allen in a disappointing contest on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback endured consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a few personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. His second one 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 result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We’re just taking it day by day,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team were unable to execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”