Little went right for Josh Allen in a frustrating contest on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen took back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller 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 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they hit our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to keep our field general healthy for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second straight game 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 opening drive of a loss to New England in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo 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 make plays 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 scenario and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
