Little went right for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to willing the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Allen stated. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to keep our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so many times on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team couldn’t make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
