Little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a close loss.
The quarterback took back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a career-high eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to top the Texans. His second one came when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender rose and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a loss to New England in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that provide the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever scenario and whatever circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
