Houston Texans Knock Off Cincinnati Bengals 19-13 in AFC Wild Card
By Josh Hill
The Cincinnati Bengals hadn’t won a playoff game in 8,400 days and that streak is going to continue. After hoping they could come into Houston and erase a Wild Card loss from last season, the Bengals fell a failed fourth down conversion short of pulling off the upset.
To the Bengals credit, they were never more than six points behind the Texans at any point during the contest, but really all that means was they were a step behind the Texans the whole way. Cincinnati couldn’t stop Arian Foster and that ended up being the downfall of the Bengals on Saturday. Andy Dalton’s lackadaisical passing performance also didn’t help matters for the Bengals.
The game was a lot closer than the Texans would have liked, and it gave some fans a scare as to whether or not the downward spiral would continue. Houston had been lined up to own the No. 1 seed as recently as three weeks ago but lost thee of their last four games to end the season and they spiraled into the playoffs.
It seems that Houston has gotten their barring back. The next question is can they exorcise their demons in New England. As the highest remaining seed left in the Wild Card round, Houston has punched their ticket to New England with the winner of the Ravens-Colts game will get the No. 1 seed Broncos. Houston was notably and publically beaten to death by the Patriots a few weeks ago, and New England is not expected to take their foot off the pedal.
The script is the same as last year so far for Houston: they’ve beaten the Bengals at home in the first round and now have a date with the No. 2 seed in the playoffs. The question on the minds of Texans fans is can they flip that script or will they fall back into the same ending as last year.