By virtue of the Texans defeating the Raiders on Saturday night and the Steelers taking care of the Dolphins, the Patriots will be hosting the Texans in Foxboro next weekend for their divisional matchup.
The Wild Card round between Houston and Oakland was more or less a pick ’em between a team without recent success in the playoffs and a team that made an appearance in the tournament in 14 years. The Houston defense was able to shut down the third-string turned starting quarterback Connor Cook, taking control of the game which eventually lead to a 27-14 victory. The Miami Dolphins have been underdogs all season yet punched their ticket into the postseason. Facing the high powered offense of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Miami never really stood a chance. Turnovers were the enemy of the Dolphins offense as they gave the ball away on three consecutive drives. This all culminated with the Steelers cruising to 30-12 victory as they will be heading to Arrowhead Stadium next weekend to face the No. 2 seed Chiefs.
This brings us to next Saturday, January 14th at Gillette Stadium where the Patriots will look to continue their success at home during the playoffs. Since the stadium opened in 2002, the Patriots have hosted 17 playoff games and have only had their season end on home turf three times. That’s an impressive feat and gives the Patriots an enormous edge heading into this game. It doesn’t help the Texans case when realizing that they have never won a game in Foxboro. The Patriots and Texans have played 8 times in the history of the two teams, the current record stands at 7-1-0 in favor of New England. The last time the Patriots lost to Houston was a little over seven years ago on January 3rd, 2010. The game was played in Houston and resulted in a 34-27 victory for the home team.
Since then it has been a series dominated by the Patriots, winning the last five straight and outscoring Houston 54-6 in the last two meetings. Former New England coaches Bill O’Brien and Romeo Crennel will look to halt the Patriots season and advance to the AFC Championship game. That is no easy task when Houston has only been able to score 17.4 points per game this season, ranking them 28th in the league. This comes as no shock considering the offense is led by quarterback Brock Osweiler. The best way to describe Osweiler’s performance this year is borderline terrible. Completing only 59.0% of his passes while throwing only 15 touchdowns isn’t what Houston expected after paying $72 million for the QB during the offseason. Tag on an additional 16 INTERCEPTIONS and that leaves Osweiler with a dismal QBR of 72.2% in 2016. Osweiler was actually so bad that Head Coach O’Brien opted to start his back-up QB Tom Savage the last three weeks of the season, over his rather pricey starter.
Now consider all of that looking to next Saturday when they will be paired up against the almost unstoppable, and well-rounded New England offense. This season the Patriots are scoring just over 10 points per game more than Houston (27.6 PPG), ranking them the third best unit in football. Brady is 39 years old and playing some of the best football in his career with help from an improved offensive line thanks to the return of coach Dante Scarnecchia. The improvement up front has also opened up holes for RB LeGarrette Blount to have a career year, scoring an NFL best 18 touchdowns and rushing for 1161 yards. The Patriots have leaned heavily on the run game and have rushed the ball 482 times the season, roughly 46% of their total play calling in 2016.
On the defensive side of the ball, the Patriots will come bolstering the #1 defense in the league in terms of opposing points per game. With shaky play from the quarterback position for Houston, expect the New England secondary to come away with a couple of INTs. The Texans defense looked sharp Saturday night against a crippled Oakland offense and a first time NFL starting quarterback, but had an average season overall. Houston gave up 20.5 points per game, ranked 11th in the league and have had issues holding teams once they enter the redzone.
Whatever stats you look at or whichever sources you read, the game really should be a cake walk for the Patriots. The two teams faced off earlier this season in week 3 with Jacoby Brissett in at Quarterback for the injured Jimmy Garopollo and the suspended Tom Brady. Brissett threw for over 100 yards and was good enough to lead the Patriots to a 27-0 shutout victory. Blount added extra help rushing for over 100 yards and scoring two TDs. All of this was without Brady.
If the Patriots win, which they should, they will be returning to the AFC title game for the sixth year in a row. Kickoff is next Saturday at 8:15 PM ET.
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