Very little went right for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback took back-to-back sacks on the team's last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender 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 defense 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 night he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. Allen passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six touchdowns in a win over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback 12 times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a smart way to keep our field general healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to get up 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 frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few personally. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had 2.5 sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in the fifth week after also being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team couldn’t execute in crucial moments.
In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
