The Colts had an 11-point lead over the Chiefs heading into the fourth quarter of Sunday’s game, but they weren’t able to finish off their ninth win of the regular season.
A Kareem Hunt touchdown run, a two-point conversion and a field goal tied the game and the Chiefs won it on another Harrison Butker kick in overtime. The Colts went three-and-out on each of their final four possessions, which left cornerback Charvarius Ward to say that he feels the Colts are close to being a real contender but are “not there yet” after failing to finish off the Chiefs.
“We gotta learn how to win these type of games,” linebacker Zaire Franklin said, via the team’s website. “The learning curve can’t be long. I feel like we didn’t play up to the standard that we wanted to play at, but credit to them — they’ve been in that type of situation and made the plays that they had to make. . . . They made championship-level plays. And we gotta be better if we’re going to be the type of team we want to be this year.”
The Colts won five blowouts during a 7-1 start to the season, but they’ve lost two of their last three games and their most recent win came in overtime against the Falcons. They remain in first place in the AFC South, but they’re just a game up on the Jaguars and two games up on the Texans with four of their final six games coming against those divisional foes. The other two are against the Seahawks and 49ers, so now would be a good time for the Colts to show that they’ve learned the necessary lessons from Sunday’s loss.
Texans edge rusher Will Anderson Jr. had the game of his life on Thursday night. He had six tackles, 2.5 sacks for 31.5 yards, three quarterback hits and a pass defensed that nearly was an interception.
The AFC defensive player of the week honor likely is already won, although Texans safety Calen Bullock should receive consideration for the three takeaways he had in the 23-19 win over the Bills. (It’s also likely another week that Browns edge rusher Myles Garrett doesn’t win the award no matter how many sacks he has. Garrett, arguably the league’s best defensive player, has not won the award since Week 12 of the 2024 season.)
On one of his sacks of Josh Allen, Anderson traveled 51.7 yards chasing the Bills quarterback, per Next Gen Stats. That is the longest distance traveled for a sack since Week 2 of 2023 and is higher than any other Texans defender in the past 10 years.
Allen lost 18 yards on the play, as Anderson nearly sacked him at the beginning of the play before Allen spun out of it. Anderson got up and chased Allen left and then back right before finally tackling him.
“That just goes back to the relentless rush,” Anderson said, via video from Aaron Wilson of KPRC. “I think coach really hit it on the head this week. It’s like, ‘Man, whatever it takes to get him down. You’re going to miss him once, but pop back up and get him again.’ It’s just crazy. . . . [Our goal was to] just be relentless in everything we do this week.”
Thursday night’s Bills-Texans game included the unusual sight of the referee getting carted off the field with an injury. But the news a day later is good.
Referee Adrian Hill is believed to have avoided a major injury and may be able to return this season, according to NFL Network.
There were concerns that Hill could have suffered a season-ending Achilles injury, but the tendon is intact, according to the report.
With Hill out, the officiating crew was down a man for the rest of the game, as the NFL only has backup officials available to step in during the playoffs, not in the regular season.
Umpire Roy Ellison put Hill’s white hat on and served as the head referee for the rest of the game.
Nearly every NFL game includes one or more injuries to players. Thursday night’s game saw referee Adrian Hill suffer a non-contact leg injury that ended his night.
And then everyone saw that the league has no viable backup plan for the unexpected departure of the chief of the officiating crew.
Oh, they have a plan. It’s not just viable. Umpire Roy Ellison was given the white hat and, eventually, a microphone. Ellison became both the umpire and the referee for the rest of the game.
Two important jobs in one, for a game with plenty of playoff implications. And with two eyes instead of four watching the action behind the line of scrimmage, Ellison missed an obvious illegal touching violation in the fourth quarter, when a desperation throw by a harassed Josh Allen clearly struck one of his lineman.
There may have been other issues far less obvious in real time. Holding fouls may have been missed. Illegal hands to the face, too. Hits to Allen that may have been roughing the passer, which falls squarely within the referee’s purview and not the umpire’s, may not have been spotted.
In the postseason, the NFL assigns five alternate officials to the wild-card round and divisional games. For the conference championships and Super Bowl, the eight-person crew has eight on-site alternates. For 272 regular-season games, an injury results in the crew shrinking by a member — and by someone else taking on the assignments of two officials.
At a time when the NFL absolutely should be implementing full-time officials, the absence of any alternates at regular-season games is jarring. With the proliferation of gambling, from which the NFL handsomely profits, some of the millions the league is making should be directed to having extra officials on site for every game that counts.
Ideally, each member of the crew would have an understudy. At a minimum, there should be one extra official who can step in if/when an injury happens.
It’s amazing it doesn’t happen more often. Artificial turf is unforgiving. The middle-aged-and-older officials are exerting themselves to keep up with the action. (And, at times, to scamper away from a trampling.) A torn Achilles tendon (which seems to be what happened to Hill) happens all the time to aging bodies — even when not trying to accelerate on cement covered by plastic grass.
Don’t expect the NFL to change anything, for one very important reason. The league views the entire officiating function as a cost that need not become more costly. In 2012, for example, the Commissioner justified a lockout of the officials by insisting that replacements would be just as effective. (Spoiler: They were not.)
But there’s no way to force the NFL to do it. No one is going to boycott NFL games because officials are part-time employees, or because there’s no extra official to step in when one of the officials is injured. Short of Congress insisting on a significant increase in the officiating budget as part of a broader look at the NFL’s safeguards for protecting the integrity of legal wagers, it will never happen.
Even if it should have happened years ago.
Texans backup quarterback Davis Mills has played well enough in the absence of C.J. Stroud for Houston to go 3-0 and get back into playoff contention. But Mills says there’s no thought that he could continue starting once Stroud is cleared to return from his concussion.
Mills said his expectation is that Stroud is set to get the starting job back, and Mills will go back to helping the team in whatever role he can behind Stroud.
“In my current situation I don’t think there’s a competition,” Mills said. “CJ’s the starter for this team. I’m just doing everything I can to bring my best foot forward every day, make everyone else around me better, and try to play my role to my best ability when I get thrown in there.”
The Texans have to be pleased with Mills’ performance in keeping the season alive without Stroud — and have to be pleased that he understands his place in the franchise.
