Atlanta and New England advanced to the NFL conference championship games with home wins on Saturday.
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FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – Early in the fourth quarter, the Houston Texans found themselves within striking distance of the heavily-favored New England Patriots, trailing by eight points. But those eight points might as well have been a Texas-sized chasm.

On first down from their own 11, Brock Osweiler attempted a 20-yard pass over the middle to wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins. In heavy traffic, Hopkins tipped the ball and New England's Logan Ryan grabbed the interception, returning it to the 6-yard-line.

The play was a virtual dagger into the heart of the Texans – and their season.

Two plays later, New England scored, a 1-yard run by Deon Lewis on their way to a 34-16 win the AFC divisional game.

“Turnovers, that’s what did it,” Hopkins said. “We can’t turn it over. We simply can’t make those mistakes. It was more than one paly. There were a couple plays. It’s tough. They played well.”

Osweiler was 23-of-40 for 198 yards with one touchdown and three interceptions. Before that fourth-quarter interception, the Texans trailed by 8 points. After the pick, the Patriots added 10 unanswered points.

“It’s very disappointing,” Osweiler said. “You need to capitalize on great opportunities against a football team like this and even though we hadn’t done that throughout the game, at the end of the day, we were still just down eight points at the start of the fourth quarter. I made a clear read. I thought I was going to have a big explosive game completion and I think the ball just got away from me a little bit. It sailed a tick high and next thing you know, it’s intercepted, so that’s my fault.

"I’ll clean that up. I can promise you I’m going to throw about 1,000 of those routes in this offseason and get that fixed.”

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The game was a microcosm of Osweiler’s first season in Houston – heavy on frustration, short on performance.

“Anytime you don’t end your season with a Super Bowl championship you’re going to disappointed and I’m certainly disappointed,” said Osweiler, who is in the first year of a four-year, $72 million deal. “The one thing I will say is that I think it’s easy to point out the negative especially on offense of what has taken place this year, but I think there was also a lot of great things that took place that we can certainly build upon in the future. But, no question about it, we have a lot to clean up moving forward into next season.”

Trailing by 11 after the first quarter, the Texans cut the deficit to four at halftime. But that was as close as they would get.

Osweiler’s lone touchdown came on a 10-yard pass to tight end C.J. Fiedorowicz in the second quarter.

Head coach Bill O’Brien deflected much of the blame from Osweiler.

“Interceptions, they are never one guy’s fault,” O’Brien said. “Obviously, as an offense, we need to score more than 16 points. You know, you are not going to beat the Patriots scoring 16 points. So, I’m not going to get into all the different plays and all that. I just know that I need to do a better job.

"Like I said, it starts with me. And, also like I said, give the Patriots credit. They did a great job.”

PHOTOS: Best of the NFL divisional round

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