Little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game on Thursday evening against the Texans.
Yet he nearly managed to willing the Bills to a win before an interception in the final minute sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.
The quarterback endured back-to-back tackles for loss on the Bills’ last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.
Following a false-start penalty created a fourth-and-6 for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's throw at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds remaining.
“We had a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
It was tough for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a career-high on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six touchdowns in a victory over the Buccaneers the previous week.
Whenever they hit our quarterback 12 times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott commented. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It is not a healthy way to compete and it’s not a smart way to preserve our field general healthy for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He indicated 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 during the game.
It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I encountered a couple personally. I need to be more effective at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was losing ground.”
Allen lost 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to lead the Houston defense. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson got up and chased him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard loss to result in a punt early in the third.
The Bills played for a second straight game absent receiver Keon Coleman after he was once more 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 loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after additionally being late for a team session.
No change. We’re just approaching it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are taking 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 best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Allen was frustrated that the Bills were unable to make plays down the stretch.
“Ultimately, we must execute, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and whatever condition, we need to discover a solution, and we didn’t.”
