Little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing game on Thursday evening against the Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with 24 seconds left.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved difficult for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a victory over Tampa Bay the previous week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a good way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple myself. I need to be better at throwing the ball away. On multiple occasions, I was going backwards.”
Allen surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack came when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and the defender got up and chased him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering 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 delayed for a meeting.
“Nothing new. We are taking it day by day,” McDermott noted. “I thought he had a improved week, but we’re handling it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that give us the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was disappointed that the Bills were unable to execute down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got execute, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and whatever condition, we need to find a way, and we came up short.”
