Allen Sacked Eight Occasions as Late Pickoff Seals Fate of Bills in Defeat to Houston
Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating contest Thursday night versus the Texans.
Yet he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an interception in the final minute ended their hopes in a close loss.
Allen took consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they hit our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself going backwards.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. His second one came when he almost sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second straight game absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a better week, but we are taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills were unable to make plays in crucial moments.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we failed to do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “Whatever situation and any circumstance, we need to find a way, and we didn’t.”