Titans’ No. 1 goal
Win at Houston would lock up AFC’s top seed
HOUSTON — Having clinched their second straight AFC South Division title last week, the Tennessee Titans need only a win over the lowly Houston Texans on Sunday to secure the top seed in the AFC playoffs — and with it the extra rest that no other playoff qualifier in the conference will enjoy.
“I want a bye week next week,” Tennessee Pro Bowl safety Kevin Byard said. “That’s the motivation to go in there and try to play our best game, so we can get that bye week.”
In addition to skipping the wild-card round, the other big bonus for the No. 1 seed is home-field advantage, starting with the divisional round the weekend of Jan. 22-23 and continuing through the AFC title game. Or, as Byard put it, a chance to force the road to the conference title to “come through Nashville” and the Titans’ Nissan Stadium.
To close the regular season, though, the Titans (115) are on the road against a division foe as they try to secure the top seed in the AFC for just the third time since leaving Houston as the Oilers after the 1996 season and the first time since 2008.
And despite the struggles of the Texans (4-12), Tennessee coaches and players know better than to underestimate them as an opponent after what happened in this season’s first meeting. Houston pulled off a 22-13 upset in Nashville on a rainy Sunday in late November when Tennessee quarterback Ryan Tannehill threw a career-high four interceptions — with two of the picks by former Titans cornerback Desmond King.
“The way we played against them the first time … we got our (butts) kicked,” left tackle Taylor Lewan said. “So we need to go play a good football team that has a solid culture in the way that they’re out of the playoffs, this is the last game of their season, but they still play so hard.”
Tannehill, who threw for 323 yards in the loss to the Texans, has been intercepted only twice over the past five games after struggling at times with turnovers this season.
“Definitely things we have to clean up and I think we have cleaned up since that game,” Tannehill said. “Excited to go out and play good football for four quarters and show what we can do.”
The Texans have improved in recent weeks, and two of their four wins have come in the past three games, including a 41-29 victory over the Los Angeles Chargers, who are still in playoff contention.
“Each game counts. It doesn’t matter what the record says or anything,” Houston defensive lineman Ross Blacklock said. “You can have an impact on this team, an impact on somebody else’s team, ruin the playoffs or whatever the case may be. At the end of the day, we are just here to get a win.”
There are smaller goals within the game as well.
Tennessee comes in second in the NFL against the run, and defensive tackle Jeffery Simmons said the Titans want to try to finish first in the league in that category. They have allowed an average of 85.9 yards rushing per game this season, less than a yard behind the 84.8 yards rushing allowed by the Baltimore Ravens. The Titans have allowed one 100-yard rusher all season — on Oct. 10, when the Jacksonville Jaguars’ James Robinson ran for 149 yards in a loss to Tennessee.
“We take a lot of pride in stopping the run,” Simmons said.
They should have a good chance to reach their goal facing a team that ranks last in the NFL at 84.9 rushing yards per game. The Texans ran for a season-high 189 yards against the Chargers on Dec. 26, but they were unable to build on that big game last week when the San Francisco 49ers limited them to 86 yards on the ground.
The Titans gave their fans good news this past week when star running back Derrick Henry, the league’s two-time reigning rushing leader, returned to practice for the first time since breaking his right foot on Oct. 31 in an overtime road win against the Indianapolis Colts and having surgery two days later.
However, the team is electing to wait until the playoffs to return him to the active roster. On Saturday, the Titans waived running back Jeremy Nichols, signed defensive lineman Kevin Strong to the active roster and promoted defensive lineman Da’Shawn Head and running back Jordan Wilkins from the practice squad.
D’Onta Foreman gives the Titans plenty of reason to let Henry stay on injured reserve until the postseason. Foreman ran for a career-high 132 yards in last week’s home win over the Miami Dolphins, and he has three 100-yard performances in five games.
Foreman — who played high school football at Texas City, a suburb of Houston — ran only seven times for 25 yards in the first game between these teams this season. He expects to have plenty of family watching his first game with the Titans in Houston against the team that drafted him in the third round in 2017 out of the University of Texas.