Little went well for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a close loss.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so many times on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
Buffalo played for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a meeting.
No change. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a better week, but we are taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and any circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
