Little went right for Josh Allen in a disappointing contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback took back-to-back sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards 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 down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender picked off the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. 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 eight times and pressured four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
“When they hit our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a smart way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was slow to get up after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. Another sack came when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just 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 wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that provide the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team were unable to make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
