Houston Texans Media Conference

Sunday, September 11, 2022

Houston, Texas, USA

Jerry Hughes

Postgame Press Conference


Texans 20, Colts 20

Q. What did you see on the interception with Matt?

JERRY HUGHES: You know, just a lot of Greenfield. I wasn't sure how close Taylor was to me, so I felt like if I could kind of get Matt to kind of open his hips and run the opposite way, I should have a lot of green grass to score.

But I guess he made a tackle, and that doesn't really happen too often on D-linemen, so I've got to be better.

Q. When you look at the fourth quarter in general, did you feel as if it was some rookie mistakes from younger players or some inconsistencies? What do you think was one of the main problems?

JERRY HUGHES: We've got to learn how to close games out. We were up on those guys at the start of the second half. The fourth quarter we've got to shut the door as a defense. When you've got someone on the run, when you've got your foot on their neck, you've got to be able to squeeze and just solidify the game.

We didn't do it this evening. We've got to learn from this game so we can figure out ways to close games, because that's the only way you're going to win in the NFL is in that fourth quarter.

Q. Jerry, can you talk about this team's run defense? Leading up to this game Coach Lovie and Miles Smith both talked about the improvements that they made to the run defense. It was good the first three quarters but in the fourth quarter it kind of fell apart.

JERRY HUGHES: Yeah, we started off strong. The crowd did a great job of just energizing us that first half. We've got to just stay with it and in the second half do a better job. We've got to understand that their backs against the wall, they don't want to lose coming out of the half down 20-3, so for us, we've got to understand that when you've got someone on the run we've got to finish them off, and we didn't do that this evening.

Q. Did they do anything differently offensively in that fourth quarter?

JERRY HUGHES: Yeah, you know, they picked up the tempo. Matt was making some great line of scrimmage checks. We were getting out of our gaps up front. We've got to be just a little bit more disciplined in that quarter.

We've got to understand when the fourth quarter is on the rise like that, that's got to be our best football, and it just wasn't today.

Q. Lovie said that sometimes it's easier to accept a tie than a loss. Do you agree with that or because you know you had a chance to keep the lead it's a little more frustrating?

JERRY HUGHES: No, I agree with Coach. It's going to give us a great opportunity to learn. The new overtime rules were put into effect this evening, so that gives us another opportunity to learn how to play in the fifth quarter there. But for us it's just all about finishing. It's something that Coach preached all training camp, and we've still got to figure out a way to do that.

Week 1 we didn't get a chance to do that, but we got the Broncos coming up fast, so we've got to turn the page and get ready for those guys and we've got to finish this because in this league if you don't, the fourth quarter can turn the game open.

DraftScripts by ASAP Sports.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports
124642-1-1041 2022-09-11 21:19:00 GMT

ASAP sports

tech 129