INDIANAPOLIS — The Tennessee Titans won a football game. It wasn’t pretty, and it wasn’t efficient, but the Titans beat the Indianapolis Colts 26-20 at Lucas Oil Stadium on Sunday. Tennessee played enough complementary football in the second half to finally put together a winning performance.

I frankly did not think the Titans were capable of that, even against a Colts team that showed just how bad it is. The divisional win moves Tennessee to 1-5. It’s not all good, and it’s not all bad either.

In the words of former Titans player David Quesenberry, “It doesn’t have to be pretty to be beautiful, right?” A few years ago, Tennessee made a habit of grinding out close wins by three points or less and stacking them. You can throw for 300 yards and lose a football game. Still, you would like to see your quarterback finish with more than 150 passing yards in a win.

Titans special teams and defense carried an ugly offense

The first half was rough. Quarterback Cam Ward went 4-of-7 for 37 yards with an interception before halftime. He was getting bludgeoned in the pocket and missed throws, and Tennessee couldn’t run the football.

The Titans offense was only in the game because the Colts couldn’t stop turning the ball over. Indianapolis had three giveaways, including a couple of interceptions from quarterback Daniel Jones, plus a turnover on downs.

Then there was the blocked punt. Femi Oladejo returned it for a touchdown, the first time the Titans have done that since Jason McCourty in 2011. It ended up as the difference-making play. Oladejo told me in the locker room it was his first touchdown since high school, when he played tight end. James Williams and Julius Chestnut were both involved in the block. Special teams coordinator John Fassel has said for weeks that his unit was getting close.

It wasn’t flawless. Kicker Joey Slye had an issue on a kickoff, and a holding penalty on the opening kickoff return set the offense back. However, the return game also handed Tennessee advantageous field position throughout the afternoon, and the Titans capitalized on some of those chances.

The defense was strong, which made the day stranger. Cornerback Alontae Taylor, the $60 million corner Tennessee signed this offseason, was a healthy scratch. He made the trip and wasn’t ruled out, and head coach Robert Saleh wouldn’t go any further than calling it a coach’s decision. Taylor was poor last week against the Houston Texans. [[FLAG:unverified]]Whatever happened appears to go beyond one bad game, possibly some violation of team rules.[[/FLAG]] Joshua Williams was active off injured reserve for the first time.

Even without Taylor, the secondary held up. Cor’Dale Flott grabbed his first interception as a Titan, and Tennessee recorded its first pass breakups of the season. Jones threw far more catchable passes than the Titans actually picked off.

Jeffrey Simmons set the tone for a young locker room

Defensive tackle Jeffrey Simmons was excellent on a number of fronts, including a critical strip of running back Jonathan Taylor that he recovered himself. Simmons has seen enough losing to know how to handle a young locker room at this stage of his career. He praised how his teammates responded instead of panicking at halftime, which he said he has seen a lot of.

“When these types of games are like this, [you] just stay in the moment,” said Simmons. “Somebody has to continue to make a play. We were still in the game. I think for me, like, when I always come into the season, it’s like, especially [in the] last couple years of my career, we come in with so many high expectations, and it’s all about the moment. And each and every time when I step on the field, especially in that last drive, is how can I be in the moment, be present, and just dominate. And I think when you could get guys to take it play by play, um, stay in that moment, be in the moment, everything else takes care of itself.

“We talked about this: everyone do your job. Somebody’s gotta make a play, win your one-on-ones. And today we did it. We did that. … It was a team effort and that’s the type of thing we need as a team to continue to stack wins.”

How Robert Saleh’s Titans handle success matters

Can the Titans stack wins? Easier said than done. Tennessee hasn’t won back-to-back games since November 2022, when it beat the Denver Broncos at home and the Green Bay Packers on the road. This iteration of the Titans has never done it.

The demeanor after the game was encouraging, though. Ward wasn’t sulking like he did after last season’s win over the Cleveland Browns, when Simmons jokingly called him the Grinch and told him to appreciate how hard it is to win in the NFL.

Saleh was level. Former coach Brian Callahan got choked up at the podium after his second win, late in his first season. Saleh’s approach is a good quality in a head coach. Celebrate for 24 hours, then understand Tennessee got away with plenty of mistakes that have killed it in other games. To their credit, the Titans pulled out of a nosedive before the spiral took hold.

Simmons once said this team didn’t know how to handle success. That was after a November 2024 win over Houston, the club’s last divisional victory. Tennessee didn’t win again that season.

The Titans return to Nissan Stadium next with a chance to do something this group hasn’t done yet.