The Houston Texans relied heavily on their outstanding rookie running back Dameon Pierce in Week 9 to move the ball on offense and found moderate success before succumbing to the Philadelphia Eagles’ overwhelming defense. Pierce has been one of the most reliable runners in the NFL this year, and head coach Lovie Smith told reporters on Friday that he remains impressed by what he has seen.
“It’s kind of the same song on a lot of what Dameon [Pierce] has been doing,” Smith explained. “Did he run hard last night? Second effort, the defensive player with him coming at, just a lot of the same things. How I’ve talked about him since his first preseason game, that’s what we see it seems like every time he gets the ball. What has changed a little bit, he carried the ball how many times last night? 27 or so? Maybe we need to give it to him more, because it seems like something positive is happening for the Houston Texans when he has the ball.”
While a Texans loss was a foregone conclusion to most analysts heading into this matchup, the competence that Houston showed in the ground game was a marked improvement over their game against the Tennessee Titans. With more efforts like the one they put together against the Eagles, Houston could put themselves in a position to play legitimately competitive football before the season’s end.
Pierce will be a key part of any win that the team manages to pull out through the rest of their 2022 schedule as the most viable offensive option currently on their roster. Given the Texans’ situation with their top two receivers, Brandin Cooks and Nico Collins, Smith and his crew of coaches will likely be handcuffed to the running game over the next few weeks as they figure out how to get quarterback Davis Mills his best targets back.