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Little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a disappointing contest on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.

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

The quarterback endured consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, leading to a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) gained 44 yards on a quick throw from Allen to a receiver, who tossed a backward pass to Khalil Shakir.

Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth-and-6 for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off the quarterback's pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute left.

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

It was difficult for the signal-caller to get anything going on a evening he was sacked a personal-worst eight times and hit four additional instances. Allen threw for 253 yards with a pair of picks and no touchdowns after producing six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.

Whenever they hit our QB a dozen times, that's unacceptable,” Buffalo's head coach McDermott said. “I disapprove of that statistic at all. It is not a safe way to compete and it isn't a good way to keep our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to improve our performance.”

Allen was sluggish to rise after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it in an awkward manner. He was asked about being hit so many times on Thursday.

It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered a couple personally. I need to be more effective at disposing of the football. Too many times, I was losing ground.”

The Bills' QB surrendered 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Anderson had 2.5 tackles for loss to top the Texans. Another sack occurred when he nearly sacked the QB near the line of scrimmage, but he escaped and Anderson got up and chased him across the field to tackle him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt early in the third.

Buffalo competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their previous contest. He was earlier benched for the opening drive of a loss to the Patriots in the fifth week after also being delayed for a meeting.

No change. We’re just taking it day by day,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we’re handling it one day at a time. It was not that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that give us the best chance.”

Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight receptions for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a score.

Allen was disappointed that the team were unable to make plays in crucial moments.

In the end, we must execute, and we failed to succeed of that this evening,” he said. “Whatever situation and whatever circumstance, we’ve got to discover a solution, and we came up short.”