The Texans offense was unconventional on Sunday.
Although Dallas edged Houston, 27-23, at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, the Texans rolled with Davis Mills and Jeff Driskel each getting a significant amount of snaps.
Mills started the game, but on Houston's second possession, Driskel entered and guided the Texans on a scoring drive. He also tossed a 28-yard touchdown pass to Amari Rodgers.
When the game ended, Mills had completed 16-of-25 passes for 175 yards and a Hail Mary interception near the end of regulation. Driskel, meanwhile, completed 4-of-6 passes for 38 yards and the score, while also running seven times for 36 yards.
"Offensively, we hadn't been able to do an awful lot, lately," Smith said. "Quarterback-wise, we made a change. We were looking for a spark. Early in the week we decided to go with this plan to use Jeff. I thought he did some good things too."
The previous two games, Kyle Allen started and finished the game at quarterback. Driskel had been on the practice squad all season long, but was pulled up twice in the first two weeks of the season, playing against the Colts and Broncos. Smith announced Mills as the starter for Sunday's game on Wednesday, and inserted him into contest early.
"That was something that we worked on all week," Driskel said. "It was a nice little package for me in there. I was excited to get out there and help the team win."
Mills, meanwhile, explained why the Texans did what they did in rotating quarterbacks.
"The philosophy was 'just keep mixing up the looks'," Mils said. "When you simplify it, you're just trying to find the way to get the ball to playmakers out in space. Jeff did that in zone-read situations, and it kind of opens things up."
For the pass-catchers, the back-and-forth between signal-callers worked well. Wide receiver Chris Moore caught 10 passes for 124 yards. Both quarterbacks had multiple completions to him.
"It was seamless," Moore said. "I felt like we did a good job of practicing it all week. We went out there and executed the gameplan pretty well."
Smith wouldn't say after the game whether the Texans would continue using both quarterbacks in the same game.
Houston hosts the Chiefs next Sunday at noon inside NRG Stadium.
