Little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Buffalo Bills to a win before an interception in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took back-to-back tackles for loss on the team's final possession, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the end,” Josh Allen stated. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to get anything going on a night he was sacked a career-high on eight occasions and pressured four other times. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
“When they hit our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it isn't a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be more effective at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. His second one came when he almost sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender rose and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots 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 taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the guys that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a score.
The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills couldn’t execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and any condition, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
