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Little clicked for the Bills' quarterback in a tough contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.

Yet he came close to willing the Bills to a victory before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes in a 23-19 loss.

The quarterback took consecutive sacks on the team's final possession, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but the Bills (7-4) gained 44 yards on a short pass from Josh Allen to a receiver, who flipped a lateral to Khalil Shakir.

After a pre-snap infraction led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, a Texans defender intercepted the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute left.

We possessed a opportunity to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “We did a good job of staying in it and our defense bailed us out a couple of times. We’ve got figure it out, and unfortunately we failed.”

It was difficult for Allen to establish rhythm on a night he was brought down a career-high eight times and pressured four other times. Allen passed for 253 yards with two interceptions and no touchdowns after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay the previous week.

Whenever they pressure 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’s not 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 sluggish to get up after a sack in the opening two quarters. He indicated he was fine and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being contacted so many times on Thursday.

It's unpleasant,” he remarked. “I ran into a couple personally. I’ve got to be better at throwing the ball away. Too many times, I was going backwards.”

The Bills' QB lost 70 total yards on the eight sacks. Will Anderson Jr. had two and a half tackles for loss to top the Texans. His second one came when he nearly took Allen down near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and the defender got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt early in the third.

The Bills competed for a second straight game absent receiver Coleman after he was again a non-participant after he was tardy to a squad gathering 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 late for a team session.

“Nothing new. We’re just approaching it day by day,” the coach noted. “I thought he had a better week, but we are taking it one day at a time. It wasn’t that it was ignored, but we went with the players that give us the best chance.”

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

The quarterback was disappointed that the Bills couldn’t make plays down the stretch.

In the end, we must execute, and we didn’t succeed of that tonight,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we didn’t.”