Tania Ganguli, ESPN Staff Writer 10y

After first loss, how do Texans respond?

HOUSTON -- This version of the Houston Texans suffered its first loss of the season Sunday. Their most important questions going forward will be about how they respond and if they'll cure what ailed them against the New York Giants.

We'll go a little bit more in depth about what they need to fix later this week. For now, let's take a look at the attitudes of the head coach and some key players as the Texans work to recover.

Head coach Bill O'Brien: "They never quit. Right down to the last play, those guys were playing hard. It was a very physical game. Like I said after the game, give the Giants a lot of credit. They obviously coached and played better than we did. This group of guys, really, they’re very focused and they have really good work ethics and they care about each other. They hate to lose. They hate it. Just like we do as coaches. We all do. They come in here today and certainly they don’t feel great about how the game went yesterday. But they know they can play better and we know as a coaching staff we can coach better."

Quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick: "It’s definitely about being steady and not letting what’s going on outside or not letting last week’s performance kind of affect the work you put in this week. And that’s kind of the big thing. Not allowing anything that happened in the past affect the way that you go about your business for the next week."

Left tackle Duane Brown: "We just have to keep it in perspective. It’s one game. Obviously, you want to win every time you go out there. We have a lot to learn from this game and that’s just what we’re going to do: We’re going to learn from it, we’re going to correct our mistakes. We have a long season ahead of us. I don’t think anyone in here is sulking or walking with their heads down. We’re all still motivated and optimistic about the rest of the year and about this week. All we can do is move on and be professional about it."

Inside linebacker Brian Cushing: "That’s the mindset after a win, too. It’s just one game. You’re only as good as your last game but at the same time, you have to put it behind you. It’s 16 one-game seasons really if you look at it and that’s how you have to treat it."

Cornerback Johnathan Joseph: "Of course, you go into every game thinking you’re going to win it but you come out sometimes as the loser and you just have to learn from it. And never forget the feeling and just go into the next game with the same mentality."

O'Brien: "Most of the guys that I’ve been around are guys that are mentally tough, the successful guys. The guys who are able to say, I’m going to play the next play. Even though this play was a bad one, I’m not going to dwell on this play. I’m going to try to play the next play and make up for it. We’ve got a bunch of guys like that on the team. They realized that was not a good game for them. Give the Giants credit, they played better than us, coached better than us. Our guys are resolute in the fact that they’re going to get the mistakes corrected and try to go out there and play better."

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