Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to driving the Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it’s not a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a few personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills were unable to execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we must execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
