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The Indianapolis Colts are set to close up shop in their second meeting with the Houston Texans today in a critical Week 15 AFC South battle in Lucas Oil Stadium. The Colts come in 9-4, and are in position to set themselves apart in the Wild Card race.
The Colts need a win as the race reaches critical mass, and just a couple weeks ago the Texans gave the Colts all they could handle despite having T.Y. Hilton’s breakout game of the season. In their last meeting, however, the Colts didn’t have Anthony Castonzo due to spraining his MCL, and surprisingly enough, Castonzo has come back very quickly and appears to be good to go.
Castonzo, was a full participant in practice Thursday and Friday, but was still technically listed as questionable. Mo Alie-Cox, and DeForest Buckner were also listed as questionable, but it appears as though the team is as healthy as can be expected, and serious injuries were noticeably absent from this week’s practice reports.
Darius Leonard didn’t practice Friday with back issues, but he was a full go Wednesday and Thursday and his designation didn’t look as though it was serious. Leonard, and Xavier Rhodes both left the Week 14 game las week, and Rhodes had the same practice participation this week. It was extremely helpful to the Colts’ defense to see that they weren’t long term issues that would warrant a designation heading into the game.
Rigoberto Sanchez had an entire week of practice as well which is somewhat mind blowing considering that he just recovered from surgery due to his cancer diagnosis. He appears to be ready to roll as well this week.
Not only are the Colts mostly healthy heading into Week 15, they need to remain healthy throughout this game being that only two games will remain and the playoff picture truly couldn’t be any tighter — within the division, as well as the setup with the fifth, sixth, and seventh seeds in the Wild Card.
DeForest Buckner and Mo Alie-Cox are active for #HOUvsIND. pic.twitter.com/tWwpB56uIc
— Indianapolis Colts (@Colts) December 20, 2020
As the Colts have announced their inactives, Buckner, Alie-Cox, and Castonzo are all good and Sanchez will return today as well.
Here are the Texans’ inactives for Week 15:
Today’s inactives for #HOUvsIND. pic.twitter.com/ie0p0uYiR5
— Houston Texans (@HoustonTexans) December 20, 2020