Taking advantage
Hilton leads Steelers with 3 sacks against makeshift Houston offense
HOUSTON — The plan was very simple for the Steelers.
Since the season-ending injury to DeShaun Watson, the Houston Texans offense went from averaging 34.7 points in six games with their rookie quarterback to 14.9 points in the past seven games.
What’s more, his latest replacement, T.J. Yates, was playing behind a makeshift offensive line that was starting its sixth different left tackle and had allowed 52 sacks, second most in the NFL.
The Steelers didn’t want to go easy on the Texans, not with an opportunity to clinch a firstround playoff bye. And they didn’t. “They had some quarterbacks that weren’t the best in the league,” cornerback Artie Burns said. “We had to get to them, rattle them, and that’s what we did early. And it showed.”
Indeed, the Steelers came after Yates from the opening series as though he stole their Christmas presents. They sacked him six times, dropped his brief replacement Taylor Heinicke another time, and finished with seven sacks — their most since the season opener in Cleveland.
What’s more, four of the sacks came in the first half — three by nickel back Mike Hilton — the most before halftime this season.
“You could tell the quarterback in the pocket was just so jittery,” Burns said. “He had a couple guys open on some plays and he couldn’t get the ball away because of the pressure.”
That’s why the Texans completed just 8 of 17 passes for 93 yards. And why they kept running the ball in the second half, even though they were trailing, 20-0, at halftime en route to a 34-7 defeat.
“There comes a point in time where they might be playing just to end the game,” said defensive end Cam Heyward, who had two sacks and a forced fumble to raise his season total to 12 — two shy of the team record for sacks by a defensive lineman, held by Keith Willis (14 in 1983). “A lot of times they were going to the run just to drain the clock.”
Or save Yates and Heinicke from more punishment, especially after each left the game to be tested for a concussion.
The Texans finished with 176 yards rushing, the most against the Steelers since Week 5 against Jacksonville. They seemed to have little interest in trying to play catch-up with their passing game, even with Pro Bowl wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins.
“We probably should have run it almost every down,” Texans Coach Bill O’Brien said.
Hilton, who had only one sack in the first 14 games, was the ringleader with three, the most recorded by a Steelers cornerback in a game (safeties Carnell Lake and Troy Polamalu each had three in a game). And it started on the very first series when he came off the right edge on third down to sack Yates for a 6-yard loss.
By the time he registered his third sack on the first series of the third quarter, coming off the edge to drop Heinicke for a 16-yard loss and send him from the game with a possible concussion, Hilton celebrated by raising his right hand and using his fingers to count to three.
“It was part of the game plan,” said Hilton, an undrafted firstyear free agent. “We felt if we add more people to the mix, we’d be able to get a lot more pressure. We did that. We felt good about it. We felt good about the blitzes we had lined up.”
The Steelers now have 50 sacks, second most in the league, and have a chance to eclipse their team record of 55, set in 1994 and 2001, in the season finale against the Browns. The Steelers have 25 sacks in their past four games against the Browns, an average of 6.2 per game.
“Somebody had to pay coming off a big loss,,” said inside linebacker Vince Williams, referring to the loss to the New Emgland Patriots eight days earlier. “We knew we had to come in and have dominating a performance.”
That was the plan. And they stuck to it..