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Very little clicked for Josh Allen in a tough contest Thursday night against the Houston Texans.

And still he nearly managed to driving the Buffalo Bills to a win before an late pick in the last moments ended their hopes 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 Buffalo (with seven wins) gained significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.

Following a pre-snap infraction created a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock intercepted the quarterback's pass at the Houston 9 with under half a minute remaining.

We possessed a chance to win it there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a solid job of hanging tough and our defensive unit saved us a couple of times. We must find a way, and unfortunately we failed.”

It was tough for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and hit four additional instances. Allen passed for 253 yards with a pair of picks and zero scores after accounting for six touchdowns in a win over Tampa Bay last week.

Whenever they hit our QB a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Buffalo's head coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that stat at all. It’s just not a healthy way to play and it isn't a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We’ve got to play better.”

Allen was sluggish to get up after a tackle in the opening two quarters. He said he was OK and that his shoulder “lost some feeling” after he landed on it awkwardly. He was questioned about being hit so many times during the game.

It's unpleasant,” he said. “I encountered 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 quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to top the Houston defense. Another sack came when he almost sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he wriggled away and the defender got up and pursued him across the field to drop him for an 18-yard deficit to force a punt in the third quarter.

Buffalo played for a second straight game without wideout Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a team meeting before their last game. He was earlier held out for the first series of a loss to New England in the fifth week after also being late for a meeting.

“Nothing new. We’re just taking it one day at a time,” McDermott noted. “I felt he had a better week, but we’re handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the players that provide the best chance.”

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

The quarterback was frustrated that the Bills were unable to execute down the stretch.

“Ultimately, we must perform, and we failed to do a good job of that this evening,” he said. “No matter the situation and any circumstance, we need to discover a solution, and we came up short.”