Christmas in May arrived on Wednesday night, as the National Football League unveiled its 2025 regular season schedule, which, in Houston, means we found out just how attractive a television product the Texans remain after another 10-7 season in 2024. How many prime time games would they get? How would the divisional opponents lay out on the schedule? All those questions were answered on Wednesday night.
Courtesy of the Texans' social media team, here is the schedule in Twitter graphic form:
GET READY FOR THE SHOW 🍿 pic.twitter.com/hRVqP1CIjq
— Houston Texans (@HoustonTexans) May 15, 2025
And in case that graphic is tough to read, here os the Texans' schedule in written form:
WEEK 1 - Sunday, September 7, at Los Angeles Rams
WEEK 2 - Monday, September 15, vs Tampa Bay (MNF)
WEEK 3 - Sunday, September 21, at Jacksonville
WEEK 4 - Sunday, September 28, vs Tennessee
WEEK 5 - Sunday, October 5, at Baltimore
WEEK 6 - BYE
WEEK 7 - Monday, October 20, at Seattle (MNF)
WEEK 8 - Sunday, October 26, vs San Francisco
WEEK 9 - Sunday, November 2, vs Denver
WEEK 10 - Sunday, November 9, vs Jacksonville
WEEK 11 - Sunday, November 16, at Tennessee
WEEK 12 - Thursday, November 20, vs Buffalo (TNF)
WEEK 13 - Sunday, November 30, at Indianapolis
WEEK 14 - Sunday, December 7, at Kansas City (SNF)
WEEK 15 - Sunday, December 14, vs Arizona
WEEK 16 - Sunday, December 21, vs Las Vegas
WEEK 17 - TBD, at Los Angeles Chargers
WEEK 18 - TBD, vs Indianapolis
Okay, just seeing the order of the games gets me excited. Let's dig into a few thoughts on this Texans slate, which will be here before we know it:
Nick Caley Bowl in the season opener
Back in January, after firing offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik, the Houston Texans hired Nick Caley away from the Los Angeles Rams to replace Slowik. Caley had been the Rams' tight ends coach, and was highly regarded around the league. Well, in his first game ever calling plays, he will get the chance to go against his old team. Hopefully, Caley is up to the task, and perhaps this benefits him, knowing some tendencies of his former team, before they've had a chance to scout what an offense coordinated by him would look like.
Home opener is a prime time affair, againLast season, the Texans, fresh off a 2023 where they became one of the more intriguing teams in the league, opened the season at home on Sunday Night Football against the Chicago Bears. This season, they will open at home in prime time once again, with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers coming to town, in a rematch of, perhaps, the most exciting game of the 2023 season, when Tank Dell scored a touchdown with just six seconds left in the game to beat the Bucs, 39-37.
Four total prime time gamesThe Bucs game is the first of four prime time games on the schedule. The Texans will again play on Monday Night Football in Week 7, when they travel to Seattle, in one of the stranger scheduling decisions by the league. The other two prime time games are against the two participants in the AFC title game last season, with a Thursday night game hosting Buffalo in Week 12, and then a Sunday night game in early December in Kansas City in Week 14.
**The most treacherous stretch is....**Probably the stretch that includes those games against the Bills and the Chiefs, as the Texans play a division road game in Tennessee in Week 11, then just three days off before playing the Bills. That's followed by a trip to Indy in Week 13, another divisional game, and then the Sunday night game in Kansas City. Three road games in a four game stretch, and the opponents are all either divisional opponents or participants in last season's AFC title game.
The most friendly stretch is....
The stretch right after the one listed above. After coming off the four games above, the Texans close out the season with three of their final four at home, and all three home games are against non playoff teams from 2024 — the Cardinals, the Raiders, and the Colts. The one road game is in Los Angeles against the Chargers, which is pretty benign road environment against a team the Texans beat by three touchdowns in the playoffs last season.
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