Little clicked for Josh Allen in a tough game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
Allen took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen 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.
“When they hit our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy way to compete and it isn't a smart way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Josh Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 total 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 occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and chased him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt early in the third.
Buffalo competed for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was previously held out for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are taking it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that tonight,” he said. “No matter the scenario and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
