DeMeco Ryans: We knew coming into this game that we were up against everybody

Texas head coach DeMeco Ryans stopped short of directly criticizing several penalties that took a heavy toll on his team during Saturday’s postgame press conference, but he made it pretty clear he felt the officiating was tilted in the Chiefs’ direction.

A pair of hit penalties against Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes — a rough pass by Texans defensive end Will Anderson and a late hit on linebacker Henry To’oTo’o — helped lead to 10 Chiefs points in a 23-14 home win. The late hit flag came after a very late slide by Mahomes, and replays showed To’oTo’o making far more contact with a teammate who was also trying to hold back from hitting the quarterback.

Ryans was asked about those calls after the game and said the team came into the game expecting things like that to favor the back-to-back champions.

“We knew going into this game, man, we were up against everybody,” Ryans said. “When I say everyone, I mean everyone. Advocates, doubt. Everyone we had to play against again today. Going into this game knowing what we were up against, we can’t make the mistakes we did. We had a lot of self-inflicted mistakes.”

Ryans cited Kai’mi Fairbairn’s missed shots, defensive breakdowns and poor pass protection as self-inflicted mistakes and said it’s an uphill battle for the team when you “marry everything else that we have to deal with” when you face the Chiefs.