Very little went well for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a smart way to keep our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills were unable to 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 whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
