Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was difficult for Allen to get anything going on a night he was sacked a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
“When they pressure our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he nearly sacked the QB 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.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously held out for the first series of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James 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’ve got execute, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
