Very little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
Allen took back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they hit our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It is not a healthy 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.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half 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 pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second straight game absent receiver Keon Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we are taking it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the team were unable to execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
