Over the last month of the regular season, the Houston Texans defense unexpectedly started showing some cracks, surrendering 20 points to the lowly Las Vegas Raiders, 21 to the slumping Arizona Cardinals, and 30 to rookie QB Riley Leonard and the Indianapolis Colts in Week 18. If you hadn't paid close enough attention throughout the season, these admittedly subpar performances could've been enough to throw people off the scent of the Texans heading into the postseason.
But if you've been along for the ride from the beginning, you knew that this wasn't the type of team that would just roll over when the lights get brightest and retreat into the offseason with more questions than answers. They'd go back to the drawing board, course correct, and above all else, they'd continue to swarm. And that's exactly what we saw during a 30-6 beatdown of the Pittsburgh Steelers on Monday night.
Now while the Steelers offense certainly isn't the greatest litmus test for the competency of an NFL defense, if you watched that game for all 60 minutes, you couldn't help but notice just how thoroughly outclassed Aaron Rodgers and co. were on Monday night. In every facet, the Texans defense put forth a performance that could be clinic tape. Over and over, one play after the next, it was nothing but relentless, technically sound, we're here to send a message effort and execution, and by the time the game was over, the message was abundantly clear.
“I think everybody knew we the best defense, and now the whole world know that. Every time we go out there, we show it,” said Texans safety Calen Bullock, who sealed Houston's victory with a pick six of Aaron Rodgers in the 4th quarter. “We take all the pride. We like that chip on our shoulder. That’s our mindset. We gotta show it. We’ve got that confidence. Couches believe in us. They believe we’ve got the guys to do it and we trust each other and go out and play fast.”
It was such a dominant showing that Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans called it, "the best performance we’ve had in our team history," and offensive tackle Tytus Howard echoed that sentiment, saying, "that was one of the best defensive performances I’ve ever seen in a playoff."
For the record, all of this praise is absolutely justified. Until the Texans win a Divisional Round Playoff game, Wild Card wins are the most consequential victories that Houston has racked up in their 24 years of existence, and earning the franchise's first postseason win on the road in such dominant fashion immediately vaults this W to the top of the list.
It helps too that this is now Houston's 10th straight win dating back to the regular season.
This high standard is exactly what the Texans have been building toward since DeMeco Ryans arrived just about three years ago. Since then, it's been a steady climb -- with a few aforementioned bumps in the road -- to eventually get to the point where there are no doubts left... this is the best defense in the National Football League, and it's not only because of the abundance of talent on that side of the ball, it's based on the foundational principles that were established by Ryans and his coaching staff right from the beginning.
"Our foundation, just swarming, is a foundation of being detailed, executing the fundamentals," Will Anderson Jr. said after the game. "Hat’s off to DeMeco of what he’s instilled When he first got here, he said: ‘I want people that swarm. I want a swarm culture.’ And that’s what’s been built here. Our standard is always high.”
Swarm culture, there it is again. It's the universal buy-in to this hive mindset and the execution of such goals that could very well send the Texans on a 2000 Ravens, 2002 Buccaneers, 2013 Seahawks type run. We've arrived at the point now where it's slowly morphing into the expectation for this season, and not just the dream.