David Montgomery — Week 1: Three Touchdowns on Twenty-Three Touches
2026 NFL Season · Half-PPR Scoring · Monday, Sep 14
Montgomery scored three times in his first game as a Texan — a one-yard run on third and one, an eighteen-yard run up the middle, and a seven-yard catch on second and seven that put Houston up 28–27 — on twenty carries for sixty yards and three catches for nineteen. Twenty carries were worth minus zero point three expected points; the three catches were worth plus two point six, in a 36–31 loss to the Bills.
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David Montgomery's third touchdown Sunday was a catch. Second and seven at the Buffalo seven, 13 39 left in the fourth quarter, Houston down 21 to 27, C.J. Stroud short right to Montgomery, seven yards, and the Texans led 28 to 27. It was worth +1.9 expected points added — expected points added is what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — and 11 points of win probability, and it finished a 13-play, 72-yard drive that had converted two fourth-and-ones, the first on Montgomery's two-yard run behind the right tackle from the Houston 37 with two 50 left in the third, after his third-and-one from the same spot had gone for nothing.
The first two were runs. Third and one at the Buffalo one with 37 seconds left in the first quarter, Houston down three to nothing, behind the right guard for one, after carries of one and none from the two and the one. Then first and 10 at the Buffalo 18 with four 53 left in the half, down seven to 10, up the middle for 18, +2.2 expected points, the longest run of his day. The full line: 20 carries, 60 yards, two touchdowns, eight of the 20 successful, four first downs, −0.3 expected points in total; three targets, three catches, 19 yards, one touchdown, +2.6. 13 of the carries came before halftime. Five of the 20 gained nothing or lost yardage, including second and seven at the Houston 39 with four 57 left, −2, on the possession that ended with a punt to the Buffalo four and the Bills' winning drive.
Houston ran 32 times: Montgomery 20, Woody Marks nine, Stroud two, Nico Collins one. Every Houston touchdown carry, and every carry from inside the Buffalo five, was Montgomery's. Marks took the fourth-and-one at the Buffalo 22 with four seconds left in the third, on the same touchdown drive, and had six of his nine carries after halftime while Montgomery had seven of his 20. Montgomery was also flagged for a chop block in the third quarter that erased a six-yard Kayshon Boutte catch and turned third and five into third and 20.
Back in June the preview put Montgomery on the watchlist: efficient but starved of volume in Detroit, now the lead back in Houston, with the bet being that a role would reverse a decline. The role showed up on the first Sunday — 20 carries, three targets, all the goal-line work — and the efficiency did not, at three yards a carry and a minus figure in expected points on the ground. Three touchdowns is the headline, and one game is the sample. Houston is home to the Bengals on Sunday the twentieth. The carries are the thing the preview asked for, and they were there.
_Data via nflverse._
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