The Kansas City Chiefs were able to turn the tables on the earlier season loss to the Texans by holding off Houston in the NFL playoffs.
In a game that neither side will likely ever forget, the Kansas City Chiefs withstood their own errors and a strong first quarter effort from the Houston Texans for a final 51-31 win and the chance to advance to the AFC Championship game.
The rollercoaster of a game began in the worst possible way for the Chiefs with a first quarter that combined a Texans team ready to play with a Chiefs team that shot itself in the foot in every aspect of the game. On the opening drive of the game, Deshaun Watson found wide receiver Kenny Stills for a 54-yard strike and the first seven points of the game. From there, the Texans just took advantage of K.C’s mistakes or poor choices.
The misery began when Dustin Colquitt‘s first punt was blocked and recovered by Texans cornerback Lonnie Johnson for a 14-0 lead early in the first quarter. After exchanging stalled drives, the Chiefs star wideout Tyreek Hill muffed a punt for another special teams miscue that allowed first-and-goal for the Texans and Darren Fells caught a short touchdown pass from Watson to put Houston up 21-0. From there, a field goal by Ka’imi Fairbairn was added to make it 24-0 at the end of a first quarter filled with dropped passes and needless mistakes on key plays.
From there, however, the tide turned as the Chiefs raced back to score three touchdowns in just over three minutes of game play. A nice return by Mecole Hardman after the field goal gave the Chiefs a short field and Patrick Mahomes threw a touchdown pass to Damien Williams. On the next series, a fake punt was sniffed out by Dan Sorensen, giving the Chiefs another short field. Mahomes connected with Travis Kelce for the first of three touchdowns in the quarter.
The Texans fumbled the ensuing kickoff and Darwin Thompson recovered and took the Chiefs to the goal line. Mahomes connected with Kelce for a 6-yard score. From there, the Chiefs made another defensive stop and drove 90 yards to close the half with another 5-yard touchdown from Kelce.
Even in the second half, the Chiefs continued to pile on the points. Damien Williams and the ground game got going with two rushing touchdowns in the third quarter to put the Chiefs up 41 points as the defense stifled the Texans’ best efforts coming out of halftime.
The Texans finally responded with a touchdown drive of their own to bring it within 10 at the close of the third quarter, but the Chiefs responded with a scoring drive capped by a Blake Bell touchdown catch, his first of the season, to open the fourth. The Chiefs added a final field goal to finish with 51 total points.
For the game, Mahomes ended up completing 23 of 35 pass attempts of 321 yards. He threw 5 touchdowns and 0 interceptions on the day and also led both teams with 56 rushing yards.
The Chiefs will now host the Tennessee Titans in the AFC Championship game next weekend for a chance at a Super Bowl berth.