In a playoff-like atmosphere on “Sunday Night Football,” the Kansas City Chiefs lost 20-10 to the Houston Texans.
Here are three takeaways from the game.
Chris Jones put the Chiefs on his shoulders
It didn’t take long for the Kansas City defensive
tackle to show he was ready to wreak havoc on a subpar Houston offensive line. To cap the Texans’ opening drive, Jones flew off the line and blew past the outside shoulder of the right guard. Quarterback C.J. Stroud tried to throw in a tightened pocket, but the hurried throw fell incomplete.
That was the first of many impactful plays for Jones, who finished the game with one sack, two other quarterback hits and a batted-down pass.
On Houston’s first scoring drive, another of Jones’ quick pressures combined with good pursuit by defensive end Ashton Gillotte to force a difficult throw. The pass was completed short of the sticks, forcing the Texans into a field goal rather than a touchdown.
In the second half, Jones came out with a clear purpose: to continue carrying the Chiefs. Jones blew up Houston’s first offensive play of the third quarter — a handoff — allowing linebacker Nick Bolton to clean it up for a four-yard loss. The All-Pro followed that up by batting away a pass on the next snap.
With the score tied 10-10 in the fourth quarter, Jones blew by the right guard once more with a clear path to a sack. Stroud evaded him — and Jones’ teammates were unable to cover the back end to finish the job. That eventually led to Houston’s go-ahead score.
An attempted resurgence in the second half
The Chiefs played an uninspired opening 30 minutes before going into halftime trailing 10-0. The defense allowed Texans’ top wide receiver Nico Collins to get wide open downfield on a play that resulted in cornerback Trent McDuffie suffering a game-ending injury — and it wasn’t even Collins’ most back-breaking catch in the first half.
Then there was the Chiefs’ offense, unable to average a first down every three dropbacks. It’s easy to imagine some frustrating (but passionate) words among the veterans in the locker room at intermission.
Whatever happened before Kansas City took the field in the third quarter, it worked. The team showcased an urgency that only Jones displayed in the first half. The offense put together two scoring drives to tie the game leading into the fourth quarter, while the defense pitched a shutout for five consecutive possessions.
That energy was present through a third-down scramble by Mahomes that fell just short of the sticks in the fourth quarter, still in a 10-10 stalemate. Chiefs’ head coach Andy Reid decided to go for it on fourth down, needing just over a yard; from a shotgun formation, Mahomes dropped back and hurried into a throw that fell incomplete through traffic. It zapped all of the team’s resurgent energy.
The Chiefs succumbed to self-inflicted wounds
There was not a good feeling to this game once starting left tackle Wanya Morris — the team’s third option to play the position if all were healthy — went down with injury on the first play from scrimmage. Reserve offensive lineman Esa Pole, an undrafted rookie making his NFL debut, manned the position for the remainder of the night.
There’s nothing the Chiefs could do about an offensive line laced with backups, but the team had a number of opportunities slip through their fingers that could have helped the result.
Kansas City’s opening drive ended with a short throw across the middle going through the hands of tight end Noah Gray. It was one of the two times Gray dropped a short pass in this game.
On one second down in the first half, Mahomes believed he got the Texans’ defensive line to jump across the line with a hard count. There was no flag thrown, but Mahomes appeared to take a sack without much urgency to escape. An open receiver was streaking across the field as he was brought to the ground.
Later, Mahomes rifled a pass across the middle into tight coverage; the ball ricocheted up and was intercepted near midfield. That ended one drive in the second quarter, and the next finished with a missed field goal by Harrison Butker from 43 yards away.
In the second half, the Chiefs managed a field goal to tie the game — but the drive was nearly kept alive on the failed third down. The play called for running back Kareem Hunt to leak out into the flat with space to run past the sticks, but the short throw was slightly behind him and incomplete.
To begin the fourth quarter, Mahomes launched a throw for wide receiver Hollywood Brown down the sideline — but the lobbed pass hung in the air, allowing the underneath defender to cover ground and nab the interception. While it was a third-down play with a punt-like result, it was nonetheless a missed opportunity.
After Reid’s decision to go for it on fourth down from Kansas City’s 31-yard line, the Texans took advantage of the short field and scored a touchdown. To put the cherry on top of shooting themselves in the foot, Chiefs’ tight end Travis Kelce finally got his hands on a downfield pass — just for the ball to fall into the hands of a Houston defender for the game-sealing interception.
