Houston Texans

Brock Osweiler Tosses Touchdown After Dion Lewis Fumble (Video)

Updated Mar. 4, 2020 12:24 p.m. ET

Fansided, Cody Williams/FanSided via NFL Spin Zone

Brock Osweiler pulled the Houston Texans within a point on a nifty touchdown pass following a costly Dion Lewis fumble.

Dion Lewis looked like the early hero for the New England Patriots. In their AFC Divisional Round matchup with the Houston Texans, he scored first on a nice reception and run-after before going 98 yards on a kick return touchdown. However, his heroism quickly turned into him becoming a scapegoat—and the unlikely Brock Osweiler looked to assume to the role of hero soon after.

After the Texans answered Lewis’ return touchdown with a solid drive and another field goal, they again were forced to kick to the speedy return man. However, he didn’t come close to taking this one to the house. In fact, what might be described as the polar opposite ultimately went down.

Lewis got bottled up by the Texans coverage team quickly, but the back refused to go down. As he tried to fight for more yardage with his legs wrapped up, though, the ball was left unsecured in his right arm. That’s when a Houston defender came bolting in and punched the ball loose before his knee was down. The pigskin went tumbling to the turf and the Texans pounced on it to pick up a big special teams turnover and start in the red zone:

Patriots fumble on the kickoff return!@HoustonTexans recover with GREAT field position!#HOUvsNE #NFLPlayoffs https://t.co/ApIzc0VMiZ

— NFL (@NFL) January 15, 2017

That’s when Brock Osweiler decided to get involved. Soon after, he pulled off a nasty play-action fake to Lamar Miller and then on a reverse that completely froze the Patriots defense. As such, C.J. Fiedorowicz was left wide-open on the right side of the end zone. Osweiler found his tight end for the huge six points:

We got a game!

Osweiler finds C.J. Fiedorowicz for the wide open TD! #HOUvsNE #NFLPlayoffs https://t.co/Ejyj7LjmKI

— NFL (@NFL) January 15, 2017

Osweiler has certainly taken his lumps this season for his poor play. But on the biggest stage he’s been on all year at Gillette Stadium on Saturday night, that’s a big-time play that worked to perfection.

The $72 million man under center for the Texans didn’t show much promise at all in the regular season, leading to his ultimate benching. Forced back into action in the Wild Card Round, though, he was quite good in the win. And with plays like this to capitalize on big defensive plays for Houston, he might be making his contract look like much less of a mistake.