Josh Allen Sacked 8 Occasions as Final-Minute Pickoff Dooms Buffalo in Defeat to Houston
Very little went well for Josh Allen in a frustrating game Thursday night against the Houston Texans.
And still he nearly managed to driving the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.
Allen endured consecutive sacks on the team's last drive, leading to a long fourth down, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to another teammate.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, a Texans defender picked off Allen’s throw at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We must figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”
Proved tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four other times. Allen threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
Whenever they pressure our QB 12 times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a safe way to compete and it’s not a good way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to play better.”
Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the opening two quarters. He said he was fine and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so frequently on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple myself. I’ve got to be better at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender got up and chased 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 consecutive matchup absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was again a healthy scratch after he was late to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a defeat to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being delayed for a team session.
No change. We are approaching it one day at a time,” the coach said. “I thought he had a better week, but we’re taking it step by step. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir topped the Bills with eight catches for 110 yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills were unable to make plays down the stretch.
In the end, we must perform, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the scenario and whatever circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”