HOUSTON (AP) — Josh Allen took the blame Sunday after Buffalo’s comeback attempt failed in a loss to the Houston Texans.

The quarterback was blunt about his need to improve after going 9 of 30 for a season-low 131 yards in the 23:20 defeat.

“It starts with me making better decisions on my part,” he said. “I know I didn’t pass the ball at high speed. I put the ball in danger, especially in the first half.”

The Bills (3-2) lost for the second straight season after opening the season with three straight wins.

“This is not a defining moment in our season,” Allen said. “It’s an opportunity to learn and grow from it. That’s what we’re going to do.”

Buffalo coach Sean McDermott praised Allen despite his tough day.

“Josh is a great player,” he said. “I’ll put the ball in Josh’s hands any day.”

Allen struggled again before halftime on Sunday, managing just 56 yards passing for a week after throwing for 42 yards in the first half of a loss to the Ravens.

“We missed it a little bit,” he said. “We were slightly wrong. This is something I need to clean up. I’m proud of how we responded in the second half…we gave ourselves a chance to win the football game.”

The Bills trailed 20-3 after a field goal early in the third quarter before scoring 17 straight points, capped by a field goal, to tie the game with about three and a half minutes left.

The Bills cut the lead to 10 when James Cook scored on a 5-yard run with about nine minutes left in the third quarter.

Rookie Keon Coleman’s 49-yard reception on fourth-and-5 put the Bills up 20-17 on their next drive. Coleman slipped on a tackle and then darted down the sideline before spinning into the end zone for his second touchdown of the season.

The touchdown pass was the 231st of Allen’s career, tying Patrick Mahomes for the most touchdown passes by a player in his first seven seasons.

CJ Stroud was called for an intentional grounding to reach fourth-and-15, putting the Texans out of field goal range with under a minute left.

A punt got the Bills to their 3 and they fumbled after three straight incomplete passes to give Houston one last chance.

“Overall, it’s up to me,” McDermott said. “We just have to do a better job. I have to do a better job in this situation.”

Dare Ogunbowale had a 5-yard run to set up Ka’imi Fairbairn’s game-winning 59-yard field goal as time expired.

“The situation at the end of the game on offense … we were in a tough situation,” McDermott said. “They had three timeouts. They have a good field goal kicker. We had to run the clock and move the chains, and that’s my job. We didn’t do that there and that’s my fault.”

Defensive player AJ Epenesa said the team must remember not to “ride the roller coaster of emotions” during this difficult period.

“Right now we are at a low point,” he said. “We lost two games but we have to try to be as consistent as possible. We had a lot of success on this team. We do a lot of great things. We’re just shooting ourselves in the foot. It’s our mistakes that allow these teams to beat us. We need to clean these things up.”

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