Very little went right for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game on Thursday evening against the Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Buffalo Bills to a victory before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback took consecutive tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but Buffalo (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who flipped a backward pass to another teammate.
After a pre-snap infraction created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “We did a good job of hanging tough and our defense bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four other times. The QB threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to play and it isn't a good way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Allen was sluggish to get up after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so frequently during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple myself. I need to be better at disposing of the football. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Texans. His second one came when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game absent wideout Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
“Nothing new. We are approaching it day by day,” the coach said. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we opted for the guys that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Khalil Shakir topped the Buffalo with eight receptions for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
The quarterback was disappointed that the team were unable to make plays down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and whatever condition, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”
