Very little went right for Josh Allen in a tough contest on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close loss.
The quarterback endured back-to-back sacks on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers the previous 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 is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being contacted so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I ran into a couple personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had 2.5 sacks to lead the Texans. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson rose and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to New England in Week 5 after additionally being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a better week, but we are handling it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys 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 score.
Allen was disappointed that the team couldn’t execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
