Josh Allen Taken Down 8 Occasions as Final-Minute Interception Seals Fate of Buffalo in Loss to Houston

Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a tough game Thursday night versus the Texans.

Yet he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an interception in the last moments sealed their fate in a 23-19 loss.

Allen took consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) gained significant yardage on a short pass from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.

Following a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for the Bills, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with 24 seconds left.

“We had a opportunity to win it there at the conclusion,” Josh Allen stated. “Our team performed a good job of hanging tough and our defensive unit bailed us out a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”

It was difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a personal-worst eight times and pressured four other times. The QB passed for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for 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’s just not a safe way to compete and it isn't a smart way to keep our field general in good shape for the rest of the season. We need to improve our performance.”

Josh Allen was slow to rise after a sack in the first half. He indicated he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was questioned about being hit so many times during the game.

“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I ran into a few myself. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I found myself losing ground.”

The Bills' QB surrendered 70 yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack occurred when he almost took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and Anderson rose and pursued him downfield to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to result in a punt in the third quarter.

Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent wideout Keon Coleman after he was once more a healthy scratch after he was tardy to a team meeting before their previous contest. He was previously benched for the first series of a loss to New England in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.

No change. We are taking it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are taking it step by step. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we opted for the players that provide the optimal opportunity.”

Khalil Shakir led the Buffalo with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and James Cook had 116 yards and a touchdown.

The quarterback was frustrated that the team couldn’t make plays down the stretch.

In the end, we’ve got perform, and we didn’t do a good job of that this evening,” he concluded. “Whatever situation and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”