Little clicked for Josh Allen in a frustrating contest Thursday night versus the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they pressure our QB 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to keep our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a sack in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo competed for a second straight game without wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We’re just taking it day by day,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
