Little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night versus the 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 close defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's final possession, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense saved us a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a good way to preserve our field general in good shape for the remaining games. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “went a little numb” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Texans. Another sack occurred when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson got up and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
Buffalo played for a second straight game without receiver Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a loss to New England in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” the coach said. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the players that give us the best chance.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team were unable to execute down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got execute, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
