AFC Divisional Playoffs Preview: Kansas City Chiefs vs. Houston Texans
The AFC Divisional Playoffs Round will kickoff on Saturday, January 18, 2025 with the first game taking place at 4:30 PM on ABC. In that game, the Kansas City Chiefs will host the Houston Texans at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium.
Currently, our friends at Bookmaker have made the Kansas City Chiefs -8 point favorites with the total being set to open up at 42 points.
Houston Texans Preview
The Texans enter AFC Divisional Playoffs game off a shocking home win over the LA Chargers. The Texans fell behind early in the first quarter but eventually took the lead in the 2nd quarter and never looked back! QB CJ Stroud threw for 282 yards, going 22/33 and throwing 1 TD and 1 INT.
The Chargers had no answer for the offense of the Texans. The running game of the Texans was led by Joe Mixon, who ran for 106 rushing yards on 25 carries.
Niko Collins had himself a game, catching 7 of 8 passes thrown his way for 122 yards and a touchdown. He has really grown into the top receiver on the team and is very tough to stop.
What was most impressive from our standpoint was the Texans Defense! They picked off Chargers QB Justin Herbert 4 times and held the rushing game to just 50 yards combined on the ground.
Additionally, if you took away Ladd McConkey, who had himself a career day, the Chargers would have only had 45 days passing! That said, McConkey had 197 receiving yards on the day, which was basically a one man show.
If the Texans are able to somehow win here in the Divisional Round, they will move on to play in the AFC Conference Championship for the first time in the franchises history!
Kansas City Chiefs Preview
The Kansas City Chiefs were off last week, thanks to having a bye as the #1 seed in the AFC. The Chiefs are not a team that is going to blow out many teams, they just sort of hang around and find ways to win football games.
The Chiefs are 15-2 SU, which was one of the best record in football, but they were not a team you wanted to bet on throughout the season, as they were just 8-9 against the spread.
Kansas City ended the season by going 3-1 with their loss coming against Denver in a game that really didn’t mean much. A lot of people felt the Chiefs threw that game, just to get into the postseason healthy and without any major injuries.
The Chiefs have a very balanced offense, ranking 16th overall behind QB Patrick Mahomes. Mahomes has thrown for nearly 4K yards this year (3928 yards) with 26 touchdowns and 11 interceptions. He is a great decision maker and simply doesn’t make mistakes.
Previous Matchup
These two teams played on Saturday, December 21, 2024, in a game where KC won 27-19. Patrick Mahomes was injured but still played in the game with a special brace on his leg. The hobbled QB threw for 260 yards in the game and also ran the ball 5 times for 33 yards.
The Texans suffered an emotional loss to Tank Dell in the game, as he suffered a gruesome injury to his knee. That loss sort of stopped the momentum Houston had and took the wind out of their sails.
AFC Divisional Game Prediction
The Kansas City Chiefs will be looking to get back to the AFC Conference Championship and potentially move on to compete for their 3rd straight Super Bowl win. To do so, they will have to beat the Houston Texans here this week in the AFC Divisional Playoffs. They’ve already done it once this season, so why would we think they couldn’t do it again. Add in the fact that they are calling for record low temps for this game Houston is NOT used to playing in these low temps and that is a BIG advantage for the Chiefs! Take the Chiefs here at Bookmaker!
Pick: Kansas City Chiefs -8
