Very little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback endured consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy 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.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Texans. His second one occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed 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 last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We are taking it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we are handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever situation and whatever condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
