Rapid Reaction: Houston Texans survive, finish strong in Week 15 win at Jets

The Houston Texans survived and gained their 10th win of the season Saturday against the New York Jets, controlling their path to a potential AFC South championship.

The Houston Texans offense wasn’t crisp overall and was a bit stale at times, but they stepped up when needed most Saturday afternoon to gain a win over the New York Jets – their 10th win of the season. Though the Texans won at MetLife Stadium by a 29-22 score over the Jets, they sure didn’t look like a team who was in the driver’s seat to win the AFC South championship as early as Sunday.

In fact, the Texans should be looking how to fix more than a few issues based on how they played overall Saturday against the Jets, a team that has just four wins this season.

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For example, Deshaun Watson was sacked six times, some of his own doing and other times because of the play of the offensive line as they continue to play mostly lackluster football this season.

The rushing game was non-existent with Lamar Miller having an ankle issue in the game, and Alfred Blue wasn’t doing much either when he had the football. Part of that is the play yet again of the offensive line, and another part was that the rushing game couldn’t create anything positive, either. Miller finished with eight yards on three carries, and Blue totaled nine carries for six yards. The leading rusher for Houston was Watson with 26 yards on four carries.

Credit is deserved for the Texans offense for their late fourth-quarter drive as Watson and DeAndre Hopkins really got the offense going and gained the lead with an amazing 14-yard catch in the end zone to regain the lead. Hopkins might just have saved the Texans’ season with a performance of 10 receptions (11 targets) for 170 yards and two touchdowns.

Again, credit is deserved by the Texans defense too as they held the Jets on a fourth-and-14 play, and later, when the Jets had yet another final opportunity to tie the game and even gain the win, Houston put up a solid defensive stop. At times, the Texans’ defense allowed plays for big yardage, but when the defense needed to step up the mos,t they did and held the lead.

For the Texans’ defense, J.J. Watt finished with two sacks, two tackles for a loss and an forced fumble.

The Jets were playing like a team who had not much, if anything, to lose, and it showed. Jets rookie quarterback Sam Darnold wasn’t an easy target to catch at times as early on he struggled, but the longer the game went, the better he played.

Darnold finished 24-of-38 for 253 yards and two touchdowns, while in comparison, Watson finished 22-of-28 for 294 yards and two touchdowns..

It is very simple for the Texans: they can’t keep playing the way they have the past couple weeks and expect to be competitive in the playoffs if they become AFC South champions.

This could be just a bump in the road for the Texans with their inconsistent play the past couple games, but it is obvious something needs to be fixed with this team and quickly, because if they don’t, there might not even be a playoff game to get prepared for.

Check out the Toro Times all weekend for more on the Texans’ win over the Jets.