Little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a close defeat.
Allen endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Josh Allen said. “We did a solid job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was brought down a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to preserve our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
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 in an awkward manner. He was asked about being contacted so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he said. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was going backwards.”
The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup without wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we are taking it step by step. It was not that it was ignored, but we went with the players that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever scenario and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
