Del Rio assesses Jags struggles vs. Houston

Posted by ESPN.com's Paul Kuharsky
Perhaps nothing has been more frustrating to Jaguars fans during the tenure of Jack Del Rio than the team's struggles against Houston.
Since Del Rio took over in 2003, Jacksonville has a winning percentage of .575 and Houston's is .350. But the Jaguars have swept the Texans only once and have a 4-6 record against them.
Del Rio answered questions Wednesday about the problems against a division foe that both Indianapolis (11-1) and Tennessee (11-2) have dominated.
Here are the relevant excerpts from his chat with Jacksonville media today:

Is there something the Texans have traditionally done so well that matches up well with your team?
"I think you get opportunities to play. I think they beat us, I think they've out-executed. I've heard players refer to things like we took them lightly; I've never taken them lightly. When I watch the tape, I know what I see. I know the capabilities of NFL football teams and players and coaches work too hard, have too much pride. Regardless of record, there is talent in this league, everywhere. So it's not like you're going down, you're a Division I team playing a Division III team and it's shocking if you lose. These things happen in this league. So when I hear comments like that, it makes me shake my head because if you've been around this game long enough you understand regardless of record, we were an 0-2 team last week, San Diego was an 0-2 team last week. Regardless of record, teams, you better prepare for them and get ready for a dog fight and that's how we're going to approach this game. What's happened in the past, hopefully if there's been any of that, we've learned our lesson because they beat us. They have beat us too often, and losing divisional games has been a major problem for us. We've got to win in the division. This is a divisional game at home. We have to have it."
Is there something the Texans have traditionally done so well that matches up well with your team?
"The one area, if I were going to give you one area, in our division, I think the rest of our division has had a stronger presence off the edge of their defense hitting the quarterback. I think their quarterback has been a little too comfortable in the games we've played. That would be the one thing I would say. Hopefully adding guys like [Quentin] Groves and [Derrick] Harvey and having Paul [Spicer] and Reggie [Hayward] get back to form and play well and having that group play well gives us a better opportunity. But I think if you don't hit the quarterback, I think any quarterback starts looking pretty good, and David Carr had some Joe Montana-like performances against us in the past. And those don't happen as often if you're hitting the guy. So if I'm going to look at one area, I'm going to say that area. We've got to hit the quarterback more and disrupt him more. But that's been a problem for us. When we haven't played well defensively that's been one of the main problems, that we haven't generated enough pressure on the quarterback."
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Later, Texans quarterback Matt Schaub was told about that assessment from Del Rio and his hopes regarding Groves and Harvey.
"That's good to know because now I'll be keeping my eye on them," Schaub said. "That's the thing in this league you want to try to put pressure on the quarterback to get the ball thrown and get him off his timing and off his rhythm. That's the way it is in this league. Everyone tries to do that. You look up and down in this division especially at all of the good defensive fronts that you see and the defensive ends who want to get up the field and put pressure on the quarterback. That's the way it is in this game. Jacksonville is definitely no exception to that."


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