As they have during the majority of the 2025 NFL season, namely during the Houston Texans' now 10-game winning streak, the No. 1-ranked defense in the league showed up and showed out on Monday night at Acrisure Stadium in a dominant Wild Card win against the Pittsburgh Steelers.
After the offense sputtered throughout the first three quarters to take only a 7-6 lead into the fourth, the defense put the game away quickly. First, it was a 33-yard Sheldon Rankins fumble return for a touchdown. Then after a Woody Marks rushing touchdown, Calen Bullock took an Aaron Rodgers interception 50 yards to the house, and the rout was on.
The Texans' 23-point fourth quarter sealed the 30-6 victory, which marked the first road playoff win in franchise history. The Texans entered the game with an 0-6 mark in road postseason games, though they had never gone on the road in the Wild Card round, since their eight previous playoff appearances all came as AFC South champions.
It was the first NFL playoff game 85 years to feature two defensive touchdowns from a team that did not allow a touchdown.
Texans ended a crazy, yet overrated, Steelers streak
It also ended a Steelers streak that dated all the way back to the 1992 season, and it's a streak that Texans fans quickly grew tired of hearing about in the week leading up to the game.
Not since October 14, 1991, when the New York Giants won at Three Rivers Stadium, had the Steelers lost a Monday night game at home. Their victory over the Miami Dolphins in December extended their win streak, which began in October 1992 against the Cincinnati Bengals, to 23 games.
The streak included a 15-0 record at Acrisure Stadium (formerly Heinz Field) and a 12-0 record during the Mike Tomlin era.
It was a cool number and whatnot, but it meant absolutely nothing. First of all, Houston never remotely cared about what happened 30+ years ago, back when their own franchise didn't even exist. Secondly, Pittsburgh was literally favored in 21 of those 23 games; anything worse than a 21-2 record in those contests would have been a disappointment.
And perhaps most importantly, the whole 23-game winning streak wasn't even really a 23-game winning streak. Read that line twice.
That "streak" conveniently ignored Pittsburgh's Monday loss at home against the Washington Football Team in 2020, simply because that game was postponed to Monday due to COVID-19-related restrictions – and, of course, there were no fans in attendance.
Because it started at 5:00 p.m. ET, it wasn't considered a traditional Monday night game. The Steelers were 6-point favorites and lost by a score of 23-17.
Whatever helps the narrative, I guess. Don't be surprised if the 23-game streak is now prefaced with "regular season", for the sole purpose of keeping it intact.
"The Pittsburgh Steelers haven't lost a regularly scheduled home game on Monday night with fans in attendance since 1991. That includes a 15-0 record at Acrisure Stadium and a 12-0 record under Mike Tomlin."
Are we doing it right?
But I digress; the Texans now have another playoff game to prepare for, something the Steelers haven't been able to say after a postseason game since the 2016-17 season, as they now find themselves on a seven-game playoff losing streak.
Houston, one of two franchises to win at least one playoff game in each of the past three years, is set to visit New England to take on the No. 2 seed AFC East champion Patriots this coming Sunday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. CT, with live coverage set to be provided by ABC and ESPN.