Dance Is Different, Song Stays Same for the Bills’ Finale : AFC: Buffalo’s final game is a defeat, this time 10-9 to the Colts. But this season, the Bills don’t make the playoffs.

INDIANAPOLIS —  Once again, the Buffalo Bills ended the season with a loss--only this time it wasn’t in the Super Bowl.

After losing the last four Super Bowls, the struggling Bills wound up 7-9, losing to the Indianapolis Colts, 10-9, Saturday, their third successive setback.

“We didn’t win as we would have hoped all year,” Bill Coach Marv Levy said. “We didn’t advance to the playoffs as we’d hoped for.

“It’s tough to always be in the game and part of the game and to be let down. It’s just disappointing.”

Jim Harbaugh, entering the game after Browning Nagle’s audition lasted barely more than one half, rallied the Colts (8-8) to their second consecutive victory for the first time this season.

Harbaugh came in with Indianapolis trailing, 6-0, and passed 13 yards to Floyd Turner for a third-quarter touchdown.

Buffalo had a chance to win on the final play, but a 46-yard field-goal attempt by Steve Christie bounced off the right upright.

“All I can say is that the last play pretty much summed up our season,” Levy said, “coming close a lot of times but coming up short.”

Nagle, who had not played all season, was given his first start in two years but set up the first two of Christie’s three field goals with an interception and a fumble.

Harbaugh replaced Nagle on the Colts’ second possession of the third quarter, and his first play was an 11-yard completion to Turner.

Two plays later, Roosevelt Potts ran 24 yards to the Buffalo 11. Then after a loss of two by Potts, Harbaugh connected with Turner for the touchdown.

“What can you say?” Nagle said. “I got the look. We got the win, and that’s the main thing. It’s a team game. I feel I have the ability to play. I got the opportunity, but it just didn’t work out.”

The next Buffalo series after Turner’s touchdown reception ended with an interception by Ray Buchanan off Frank Reich, who was starting for the second game in place of injured Jim Kelly.

The Colts then moved 51 yards, including a 28-yard run by Marshall Faulk, before Dean Biasucci kicked a 22-yard field goal for a 10-6 lead.

Christie kicked his third field goal, a 24-yarder, with 10:33 left in the game, and the Bills’ final possession reached the Indianapolis 28 in the closing seconds before Christie’s missed field-goal try, his second of the game.

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Rookie Rushers

Marshall Faulk of the Indianapolis Colts had 82 yards rushing Saturday and finished w ith 1,282 on the season. A look at how Faulk’s rookie season rates among some of the premiere running backs in NFL history:

Player Year Yds Avg TD Marshall Faulk 1994 1,282 4.1 11 Emmitt Smith 1990 937 3.9 11 Barry Sanders 1989 1,470 5.3 14 Thurman Thomas 1988 881 4.3 2 Eric Dickerson 1983 1,808 4.6 18 Marcus Allen 1982 697 4.4 11 Earl Campbell 1978 1,450 4.8 13 Tony Dorsett* 1977 1,007 4.8 12 Walter Payton* 1975 679 3.5 7 O.J. Simpson* 1969 697 3.9 2 Gale Sayers* 1965 867 5.2 12 Jim Brown* 1957 942 4.7 9

* 14-game season