During his first year as a head coach in the NFL, DeMeco Ryans faced adversity right out of the gate with his team suffering losses to the Baltimore Ravens and the Indianapolis Colts.
With his team having an 0-2 record heading into the Week 3 matchup against the Jacksonville Jaguars, Ryans was not only looking for some sort of spark from his team, he needed a win in the worst way.
I don't know if Ryans believes in Déjà Vu or not, but he finds himself in the same position in 2025, needing a victory in Jacksonville for his team's first win of the season after dropping games against the Los Angeles Rams and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
“2023 seems so long ago," said a smiling Ryans at his press conference on Wednesday. "I think it's very similar when we're in the same spot, I believe. We went 0-2, going to face Jacksonville, I think, for the third game, if I remember correctly. Kind of the same spot we're in here.
"But it's just different circumstances, different team. Each year, to me, the team is different with its own different set of issues. Every year, your team has to grow, and you have to grow through some things. That adversity, what is it building amongst your team? Is it building that resilience and the resolve that you need to sustain throughout the season?
"It's about how you rebound, how do you keep pressing forward, and how do you finish the race? That's what our team has to do. We just have to go out and finish the race. It's a long season. We're not allowing two games to reflect or dictate who we are as a team. We just go to go out and play good football.”
In the 2023 matchup against the Jaguars, quarterback C.J. Stroud and the Texans' skill players put on an offensive masterclass with a 37-17 blowout victory over Jacksonville.
Stroud finished the game with 280 yards and two touchdowns. For Houston to secure its first win of 2025, Stroud will have to deliver a repeat performance, something he knows his team needs, as they have struggled offensively throughout the first two games of the season.
“I like it. I mean, I don't like it, but I'm saying, I like that I've had a history with this," Stroud said about the adversity from the past. "One thing that I've learned is when you lose, or when you're not doing the best, is when the people who really support you, and who don't, come to fruition. They voice their opinions, good or bad.
"So, for me, it's really good to look myself in the mirror, or look around who's around me, see who's really for me, who's not and I think for this team, the same thing. So, in those times grateful because I know what type of team we are, we're very close, if we don't make a couple mistakes in the fourth quarter, in the [Los Angeles] Rams game and in this past game, everybody's smiling and saying how great we are. So, I don't have faith in man, I have hope in man.
"But my faith is in God, and I know he has me in this position, for this team, for this coach, for everything, for a reason. So, I'm happy, and I'm hopeful and faithful to the process. It's not overnight, so I'm just staying true to it.”