Colts beat Texans — then the Colts fire their coach, and Texans GM takes leave of absence

Indianapolis • Indianapolis Colts coach Chuck Pagano never asked his team to win Sunday’s season finale for him.

They did it anyway — and he lost his job anyway.

With a dismal season drawing to a close and Pagano’s fate seemingly decided, Jacoby Brissett threw for one touchdown, Marlon Mack ran for another and Adam Vinatieri made two field goals to send their coach out with one last victory celebration, 22-13 over Houston.

“I was eavesdropping a bit and he hit it right on the head, those five minutes in the locker room was just the best Christmas gift, New Year’s gift,” Brissett said. “You see the smiles and the feeling of finally finishing. After the game, Chuck gave us one of the greatest speeches I ever heard. He said no matter what grade you get, from ‘A’ to ‘F,’ you don’t get an ‘I.’”

Less than two hours later, he was out of a job.

Seventeen players, including Andrew Luck, finished the year on injured reserve. The Colts (4-12) blew seven second-half leads, missed the playoffs for the third straight year and finished with their first losing record since 2011.

Now comes the hard part — coping with changes.

Before the official announcement, Pagano thanked team owner Jim Irsay for giving him a chance to be a head coach, and his players for continuing to play hard. He said he enjoyed working with general manager Chris Ballard and even thanked reporters.

“We fell short, I fell short,” Pagano said. “We didn’t meet our goals and I’m sorry that we didn’t, we haven’t hoisted that thing (the Lombardi Trophy) yet. I’ll continue to have faith in our players that will happen at some point for this organization.”

Houston’s plight has been equally bad.

The Texans (4-12) finished with six straight losses.

Less than an hour after the game, general manager Rick Smith announced he would take an immediate leave of absence to help his wife, who is battling breast cancer. And Houston can’t even take solace in getting a high draft pick because it doesn’t have a first- or second-rounder.

A dull season finale didn’t help matters.

Brissett threw a 6-yard TD pass to Jack Doyle on the first play of the second quarter for Indy’s first score, and the Colts took the lead for good when Mack scored on a 2-yard plunge midway through the third quarter.

All the Texans could muster were two long first-half field goals and a 2-yard TD run from Alfred Blue in the second quarter to take a 13-7 halftime lead. But the offense gave away two points on a safety early in the fourth quarter and managed only two first downs and 29 total yards in the second half.

“I don’t want to go down that road,” coach Bill O’Brien said when asked about his job status. “I just want to reflect on this one, think about improvements that need to be made and go from there.”