Insider: Shane Steichen's fingerprints all over his first win as Colts head coach

HOUSTON — Shane Steichen did not want to make this win about him.

Actively tried to avoid it, in fact, in both his postgame speech to the team in the locker room and his postgame press conference with the media.

When the new Colts head coach was asked about the feeling of getting his first win, he reflexively and automatically deflected any praise to the players.

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But make no mistake about it, Steichen’s fingerprints were all over Sunday’s 31-20 win over the Texans, a significant victory for the Colts, not because of Houston’s quality, but because of what it represents for the franchise.

The Colts (1-1) played a terrible Texans team twice last season. Indianapolis had to come back to tie Houston (0-2) to open the 2022 season, then lost to the Texans at home, the seventh consecutive loss in a dismal Colts streak that extended to eight in last week’s season opener, finally snapped by Steichen this week.

The team’s new head coach tried to sidestep all of that context.

DeForest Buckner stepped right into it, the team leader handing Steichen the game ball after the first win of his NFL career.

“He was trying to play it all cool,” backup quarterback Gardner Minshew said. “But then, when we gave him the team ball, his voice was cracking a little bit. We see everything that Shane puts in. He works so hard. He wants this worse than anybody.”

From start to finish, Steichen put his imprint on this demon-exorcising Colts win, a win that was the final step in the franchise’s effort to put the 2022 collapse behind it.

Rookie quarterback Anthony Richardson, the player Steichen hand-picked, scored the first two touchdowns.

When Steichen finally finished hiring his staff and started working on the NFL draft’s quarterbacks in March, he only needed a couple of hours of tape to stop general manager Chris Ballard, bring him into his office and say that Richardson could do a lot of special things. After two years spent working with Jalen Hurts in Philadelphia, building one of the NFL’s most dynamic offenses around his quarterback’s legs, Steichen knew exactly how he wanted to use Richardson’s 4.43 speed.

Houston got a double dose right away. Richardson darted through the middle and ran away from the Texans secondary for an 18-yard touchdown on a quarterback draw, the same kind of play Hurts used to beat Indianapolis at Lucas Oil Stadium last year and a staple of Steichen’s offense.

The second play showcased his creativity.

The Colts faked an end-around to Josh Downs, slipped tight end Kylen Granson behind the offensive line as a lead blocker and got a devastating crackback block from Michael Pittman Jr. to spring Richardson into the open after he’d wheeled away from the fake and taken off in the other direction.

Steichen knew the play would work. He’d spent the week harping on it, imploring Pittman to nail the block, because he knew it was headed for the end zone.

But Steichen’s defining quality as an offensive coordinator isn’t his ability to spring running quarterbacks.

The new Colts head coach made his name because of his adaptability, his ability to create offenses for Philip Rivers, Justin Herbert and Hurts, three quarterbacks with distinctly different styles. When Richardson suffered a concussion at the end of his second touchdown run that forced Steichen to put his flexibility on display in the middle of the game, two series later.

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Minshew has plenty of experience in Steichen’s offense.

He can’t run like Richardson or Hurts.

“Obviously, the game plan is the game plan,” Steichen said. “There’s certain things that we don’t do with Gardner that we do with Anthony, but as far as the pass game, him operating it, he was efficient.”

Minshew was brought into Indianapolis for a moment like this.

A backup quarterback has to be able to step into any situation, run a game plan devised for another player, on little practice.

“You don’t get any reps,” Minshew said. “You get zero reps through the week.”

Minshew, though, has the luxury of playing for a head coach who intuitively understands him, and knows how to tailor the game plan around him on the fly.

“I feel super comfortable in Shane’s offense,” Minshew said. “Got a ton of reps this offseason with our (No.) 1s, that starting offensive line, those receivers, so they all made it really easy for me to come in today.”

Using the quick, short throws that Richardson had to march the Colts the length of the field on the first series, Minshew directed a six-play, 76-yard touchdown drive and then a 14-play, 75-yard touchdown drive that gave Indianapolis a commanding 28-10 lead, a lead big enough to withstand a second-half slowdown and hand the Colts the win.

“Those first few drives, felt like we were rolling,” Minshew said. “Slowed down in the second half, that was pissing me off a little bit. I think we could have finished better.”

Steichen likely agrees.

And he’s got his work cut out for him going forward. Not every team will be the Texans, a thin roster depleted further on Sunday by injuries to some of its best players.

The first win of his career was a sign that Steichen isn’t overmatched by the role, and that the same flexibility that marked his time as an offensive coordinator will be key to his role in developing both Richardson and a Colts roster that’s in transition.

“You could tell it meant a lot to him,” Buckner said. “I can only imagine being the head coach of an NFL team, that’s your whole dream, your entire life, finally getting the first win and then getting the game ball from your players, it means a lot to him, and it means a lot to us.”

Even if Steichen doesn’t want to admit it.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Colts: Shane Steichen's fingerprints all over his first win