A second straight Saturday saw the Texans win a preseason game on the road.

And just like seven days ago in Green Bay, the Texans leave Arlington happy with a victory, but looking to improve in a variety of areas.

Houston topped Dallas, 20-14, as the defense came up with four takeaways. A Jacob Martin strip-sack 50 seconds into the game, set the Texans up with a 1st-and-10 at the Cowboys' 23-yard line. Seven plays later, running back Mark Ingram II was in the end zone with a score.

Ingram II finished with 24 yards on seven carries, and explained the work that still needs to be done as a team.

"Obviously, we don't want to be a team that has pre-snap penalties," Ingram II said. "We don't want to be a team that lets our quarterback get hit. We want to take care of the football. We want to be able to convert 4th-and-1. Be able to sustain drives. We want to be able to convert third downs and be able to sustain drives. We want to stay in front of the chains, so we're not playing behind the chains. We want to limit big plays. We want to have big plays. We want to be able to execute offensively, defensively and special teams, and be able to play complementary football."

While Ingram II gave a veritable laundry list of areas to improve, head coach David Culley described why Houston wasn't able to convert any of their 10 third down opportunities.

"We need to be more consistent," Culley said. "Tonight, it seemed like, and I'll have to take a look at the video to make sure, but it seemed like tonight, we got a few more blitzes than we got in the first game. We knew that could possibly happen. I think it disrupted us a little bit."

The Texans quarterbacks were sacked once on the night, and hit twice. Rookie Davis Mills completed 10-of-16 passes for 115 yards, and said the Dallas defense did a "good job" disguising some blitzes, and what that means for the week ahead at the Houston Methodist Training Center.

"That gives us a ton of really good practice for moving forward going into the season, communicating with the line and protection, and just making sure we're on top of everything," Mills said.

Culley said the Texans will "get better at that" and correct the mistakes from the win over the Cowboys.

Houston will wrap up the preseason slate next Saturday night at NRG Stadium against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at 7 p.m. CT on ABC13.