The Houston Texans defense did exactly what coach Lovie Smith preaches.
Actually, rookie safety Jalen Pitre was the driving force behind both of the Texans’ takeaways against the Chicago Bears in Week 3 as he intercepted quarterback Justin Fields twice.
However, the offense merely frustrated their coach as they could not cash in on both free possessions.
With Pitre’s first quarter takeaway, quarterback Davis Mills threw a pick of his own in the red zone to vaporize any chance to put points on the board in a close contest, let alone fail to capitalize on Pitre’s gift.
With Pitre’s fourth quarter interception, the offense went three-and-out.
Smith appreciates the work that the defense did in generating takeaways, but also wished they had cleaned up the missed tackles and chunk plays.
“I talked about what the defense needs to do, too many missed tackles, can’t give up the big explosive plays, all that,” Smith said.
Nevertheless the offense was a bigger issue with how they couldn’t produce points despite the opportunities.
“Offensively when we do take the ball away, when there is a positive play from the defense, it doesn’t do any good to take the ball away if you don’t get points off of it,” said Smith. “It’s about that. Take the ball away, you need to be able to get points off of it. We had favorable field position a few times with that.”
The Texans fall to 0-2-1 on the season and go home to play the Los Angeles Chargers (1-2) for Week 4 at NRG Stadium. Houston has another chance to apply Smith’s philosophy and add points upon getting takeaways.
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