Fans matter.
But Texans fans REALLY matter...especially when they're loud and in the stadium right before kickoff at an NRG Stadium game.
Head Coach DeMeco Ryans enters his second season on the job, and he helped engineer a near-180 degree turnaround in 2023, as Houston won 10 games and surged into the playoffs after three straight double-digit loss campaigns.
When the Texans hosted Cleveland in the Wild Card Round of the playoffs in January, the home crowd infused the squad with an extra oomph that helped the Texans roll to a 45-14 blasting of the Browns.
"With fans being in early, being loud when we're in the stadium, it's a really unique and really cool atmosphere, especially playing here in NRG Stadium," Ryans said. "When it's packed and it's loud, I just think back to our playoff game versus the Cleveland Browns here. It was just very a special moment to see how packed the stadium was and what it meant to our players. It provides them with more juice, more energy to go out and execute their job."
"They pump energy into our our team. We feel it. Our players feel it. Coaches feel it. Everyone feels the energy that our fans bring to the game." Texans Head Coach DeMeco Ryans
Ryans wants that enthusiasm from January to carry over into the 2024 season, which features a home schedule of eight games, beginning with a Sunday Night Football showdown in Week 2 against the Bears. Ryans, who spent the first six years of his decade-long NFL playing career with the Texans, knows what a boisterous home crowd, in their seats at kickoff, can mean.
"They pump energy into our our team," Ryans said. "We feel it. Our players feel it. Coaches feel it. Everyone feels the energy that our fans bring to the game."
Ryans and the Texans begin the regular season with a Week 1 road contest at the Colts, before returning to Houston for the following week's matchup with Chicago.
