Stroud’s one interception led to an Indy touchdown, but Houston still managed to win a one-score game. All of the Texans’ losses have been by eight points or fewer.
“How we’re finishing — that’s the difference,” coach DeMeco Ryans said. “We have resolve. We’re playing 60 minutes. We’re no longer looking at a bad play here or there and thinking that it’s going to send us into the tank.”
As a result, the Texans are back in the playoff picture.
Indy, meanwhile, has struggled since it rolled through the first eight games of the season.
The Colts have lost two straight for the first time and three of their last four. Daniel Jones, who continues to play through a lower leg injury, was 14 of 27 for 201 yards and two TDs. Jonathan Taylor, the NFL’s leading rusher, was held to 85 yards on 21 carries and failed to score for the fifth time this season.
Indy had a chance to complete a late comeback when Jones drove the Colts to Houston’s 31-yard line with less than two minutes to play, but a drop by Josh Downs on third-and-9 and an incompletion on fourth down ended the drive — and Indy’s perfect home record.
“Sometimes you win the tight games, but when you lose the tight games it’s frustrating because you’re like ‘Shoot, we could have had that,'” Colts coach Shane Steichen said. “You look back, it’s three or four plays when you lose the tight ones so we’ve got to find a way to get those three or four plays when it is a tight game.”
The Texans were in control most of the day, taking a 3-0 lead on their first possession and responding immediately after Stroud’s interception led to 19-yard TD pass from Jones to Alec Pierce. Mike Badgley’s extra-point try hit the left goal post, keeping the Colts’ lead at 6-3.
Chubb’s 4-yard run to make it 10-6 and a 43-yard field goal to open the second half extended Houston’s lead to 13-6. Jones tied it again with a 12-yard touchdown pass to Tyler Warren late in the third.
But the game swung on a critical pass-interference call on Indy cornerback Kenny Moore on third-and-15 early in the fourth — after the play clock also appeared to run out. The Texans capitalized four plays later with Collins’ 7-yard scamper around the right side for a 20-13 lead.
“When the clock hits zero, (the back judge) looks down to the ball and if the ball is snapped as he looks down from the clock to the ball, we leave that alone. That’s what he ruled on the play,” referee Clay Martin told a pool reporter before addressing the pass interference call. “The calling official had an arm grab at the top of the route. When you look back, the ball was in the air, and when you see the ball in the air, that makes it pass interference.”
All Indy could muster the rest of the way was a 42-yard field goal.
