Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass 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, Calen Bullock intercepted Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.
“We had a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved 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 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it’s not a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 sacks to lead the Texans. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender rose and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second straight game without receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re taking it one day at a time. It was not that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and whatever condition, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
