The Houston Texans and Tennessee Titans (meeting in the NFL's 'Toilet Bowl' match up of the week) are both hunting for their first respective wins of the season. One team (Houston) came into 2026 with Super Bowl aspirations, while the other (Tennessee) entered this year's campaign looking to escape the basement of the AFC in order to actually look competitive on a regular basis.
Needless to say, a combined opening record of 0-8 has rendered both of those endeavors as being colossal whiffs at the moment. However, with 13 games still yet to be played in the still-young season, neither team should be trying to pack it in anytime soon.
With that said, the Texans are looking to finally conquer their first opponent of the season, and the Titans look exactly like who they'd need for such an occasion. However, there are three key factors to consider if Houston actually wants to get out of Nissan Stadium on Sunday without adding yet another loss to an already-porous win/loss record.
Three keys for a Houston Texans win on Sunday vs. the Tennessee TItans
The pass-first mentality must remain
Last Sunday against the Dallas Cowboys, the Texans threw the football on first down a total of 13 times out of 52 plays (25%). On those 13 plays, quarterback C.J. Stroud led the offense by going 11/13 for 175 yards. When Caley sat back and allowed Stroud to dictate the flow of the offense, he proceeded to put on his Battle-Red-colored apron and cook up against the Cowboys secondary.
Especially with the absence of any kind of threat from the ground game, Stroud and his running mate in wide receiver Nico Collins might have to plan on doing the heavy lifting again through the air (again).
To the Titan's credit however, they do have the 12th-best secondary in the NFL in terms of passing yards allowed per game at 209.8 (while Houston has the seventh-best passing unit per game at 264.8).
Jeffrey Simmons must be neutralized
Titans All-Pro defensive tackle Jeffrey Simmons has been a menace to Houston's various offensive game plans throughout the years. Last season in particular was a new-low for the Texans against SImmons, as he was allowed to sack Stroud in 2.09 seconds (with a 0.32 get-off time at the line of scrimmage), which was the fastest mark of the last couple of seasons at the time. Normally, defensive tackles aren't supposed to be able to do that.
Currently, Simmons is having an effective start to the 2026 season, with rankings of:
- First in tackles: 24
- Second in stops (run stuffs): 18
- Tied for eighth in quarterback pressures: 16
- Tied for eighth in quick quarterback pressures: 6
If Houston wants to look consistently competent while the offense is on the field, it must be priority #1 to make sure that Simmons isn't allowed to wreck the game plan. Double-teams, chips, pocket movement, schemed avoidance runs and/or quick-pass plays should be the norm in this game.
Adjust secondary coverages
According to NFL Next Gen Stats, Houston's prolific pass pilfering pair of cornerbacks in Derek Stingley Jr. and Kamari Lassiter "have pressed opposing receivers on career-low 11.0% and 7.5% of snaps this season." This is with the two also increasing their pre-snap cushion, lining up 7.8 and 8.1 yards from the line of scrimmage (marks higher than last season's 5.8 and 6.2 yards respectively).
In laymen's terms, Houston's defensive scheme (whether defensive coordinator Matt Burke or head coach DeMeco Ryans) has called for two of the most potent aerial defenders in the NFL to effectively be neutralized from key plays due to positioning or being made to give opposing wide receivers too many allowances.
This has resulted in the Texans dropping three of their first four games in the same exact way: The offense gives the defense a lead with roughly 2:00 left in the game, only for Houston's soft zone scheme to allow urgent teams to march right down the field and pick up the points they needed on that day for victory. At the same time, the defensive miscues have also led to Burke handing play calling duties back over to Ryans for the time being.
If the Texans don't want another nightmare scenario like they've experienced all throughout September, they need to stop allowing offenses to have free first downs by coverage scheme and actually get back to having players like Stingley and Lassiter forcing the issue at the line of scrimmage.
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