Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest Thursday night against the Texans.
And still he came close to willing the Bills to a win before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a close defeat.
The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the Bills’ final possession, resulting in a long fourth down, but Buffalo (with seven wins) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
After a false-start penalty created a fourth down situation for the Bills, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.
“We had a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Allen said. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”
It was tough for Allen to get anything going on a night he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four additional instances. The QB passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers last week.
“When they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to play and it’s not a good way to preserve our quarterback in good shape for the rest of the season. We’ve got to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his left shoulder “lost some feeling” 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 ran into a few personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I was losing ground.”
The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack came when he nearly took Allen down near the line of scrimmage, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills played for a second consecutive matchup without receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier held out for the opening drive of a defeat to New England in Week 5 after also being delayed for a meeting.
No change. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott said. “I thought he had a better week, but we are handling it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that give us the optimal opportunity.”
Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.
Allen was frustrated that the team were unable to make plays down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we’ve got perform, and we failed to succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the situation and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”
