Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to keep our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being contacted so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Texans. Another sack came when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” the coach said. “I felt 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 best chance.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen 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. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
