Very little clicked for Josh Allen in a frustrating game Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted Allen’s throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a good way to keep our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple myself. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack came when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the players that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
