Houston’s offense has had some struggles in recent weeks.

The Texans sputtered against the Jets in a bad loss and barely got enough out of an offense down a number of players to win against the Tennessee Titans, but were hoping for an improvement this week against the Browns in an important matchup as Houston looked to keep pace in the AFC playoff picture.

But that improvement never came, as Houston could never get anything going against a stingy Cleveland defense and looked lackluster in a 36-22 loss.

“We just couldn’t get moving on offense,” said Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans. “No matter what happened we just couldn’t move the ball. Anytime we had a positive play, we’d end up having a negative play right after that and it seemed like we couldn’t get out of our own way. From penalties to negative yardage, we stayed behind the chains and that can’t happen against a very good defense.”

The Browns came out with big plays from the start, returning the opening kickoff past their 40 and then hitting a huge pass on the first play from scrimmage that got them inside Houston’s 10-yard line. They got their touchdown on a 4-yard run by Jerome Ford within 2 minutes of the start of the game to take the lead.

Houston’s offense couldn’t get anything going through the first quarter and Cleveland doubled its lead early in the second on a big 75-yard touchdown pass from Joe Flacco to Amari Cooper. But Dameon Pierce got Houston back into it with a much needed 98-yard kickoff return for a touchdown. They followed that up with another touchdown on a pass from Flacco to David Njoku. Cleveland had a chance to add to the lead shortly before halftime, but Derek Stingley came away with an interception in the endzone to keep the deficit at 22-7.

“There were self inflicted wounds in critical moments and the game just got away from us,” said quarterback Case Keenum. “They have one of the best defenses in the NFL and then on offense they had Joe (Flacco) and their receivers playing great and it was tough keeping up. You go through tough games in this league but it’s about getting back up and getting back out there. We still have a chance and an opportunity, so we have to get back up, there’s still a couple games to go and we’ll see how this thing shakes out.”

The second half was more of the same for Houston. Joe Flacco threw another touchdown to Cooper from 7-yards out late in the third quarter and Kareem Hunt ran in a 1-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter while Houston’s offense never came close to getting them back in it, with Davis Mills throwing two garbage time touchdowns to trim the deficit before things ended.

The loss dropped the Texans to 8-7, Houston will be at home again next week when they play the Titans in their home finale. It will be another huge game as Houston tries to keep their playoff hopes alive.

 “The main thing is we have to play better football,” Ryans said. “Before we have the opportunity to talk about playoffs or getting in or anything like that you have to play better and you have to earn those spots to get in the playoffs. You can talk about that stuff but until you go out there and earn it and play to that level then it doesn’t matter. We have to do a much better job collectively.”