The Colts entered the 2024 season having not allowed a 150-yard rusher in their previous 56 games.
In the Colts' 29-27 loss to the Houston Texans on Sunday at Lucas Oil Stadium, veteran running back Joe Mixon ripped off 159 yards on 30 carries, ending that streak.
Mixon's final three carries for 16 yards – which came after quarterback C.J. Stroud completed a third-down pass to wide receiver Nico Collins to move the chains late in the fourth quarter – sealed Houston's win.
"They did a great job rushing the ball today," defensive tackle DeForest Buckner said. "As a D-line, we gotta do a better job with getting off blocks, obviously, not having too many busts when we're blitzing or whatever it is. We kind of beat ourselves."
Buckner added the Colts' defense has a "sour taste" in its collective mouth after letting the Texans' run the ball "carefree" on Sunday.
As a team, the Texans totaled 112 rushing yards in two games in 2023 against the Colts. Sunday – Mixon's debut with the Texans after seven seasons with the Cincinnati Bengals – was a different story.
"They did a good job of putting us in tough situations," linebacker Zaire Franklin said. "I think credit to Nixon — he ran very patient today. He was looking to go anywhere, he was breaking off his paths, cutting back and testing the edge, he kept everybody honest. I think that's why he found some success."
Colts safeties Nick Cross and Julian Blackmon accounted for 15 of the Colts' 34 tackles against the run on Sunday. But while the Colts acknowledged there are plenty of things to clean up and improve upon against the run in Week 1, there wasn't a shortage of confidence in this team's ability to make those fixes starting next week against the Green Bay Packers.
"Missed tackles, guys not being in the right gap, whatever it is. Little things that we can fix," Buckner said. "It's not alarming to me at all right now. It'll be a problem if we're midseason and it's still happening. Alarms aren't going off. We're going to watch the tape, see what we can clean up and I'm confident we'll get it fixed."
