HOUSTON _ Call it a full-circle moment Sunday here at Reliant Stadium when Joe Burrow and his Bengals muscled out a 20-6  throwback victory over Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud and his AFC heavyweight Texans.

It will be recalled that when Stroud was a rookie in 2023, the Bengals were coming off their two most impressive wins of the Zac Taylor Era with dominations of the elite 49ers and Bills before he cooled them off by pulling out a last-play win at Paycor Stadium. The Texans have been in the playoffs ever since, and now the Bengals are looking to join them.

With a different kind of on-field culture fueled by their new-look defense, the Bengals roared to 2-0 in old school AFC North fashion with relentless pressure of Stroud (four sacks for the second straight week) to go with four tackles for loss, and two more Griddy-busting touchdown catches from All-Pro wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase.

Burrow said it all felt a little bit like 2021, that Super Bowl year the offense complemented an alert, opportunistic defense with solid, mistake-free play.

"We came in here, and we wanted to make a statement," Taylor told his team brimming with what could be their most complete win since those heady days of 2023.

Taylor pointed to two more 50-yard bombs from kicker Evan McPherson, including his obligatory 58-yard field goal, a game-changing fourth-and-one red-zone stop of Texans running back David Montgomery in a scoreless first half as massive as the man who did it, defensive tackle Dexter Lawrence II, and seven Houston drives starting inside its own 25.

"That's a good team over there," said Bengals center Ted Karras of a Houston team that has made the playoffs the last three years. "We'll see them again in January if we keep taking care of business."

Taylor liked the complementary aspect of his second straight 2-0 start.

"The stat sheet is not going to show that it was a great overall performance," Taylor said. "But it felt like we were able to run the ball in some tough situations and move the field like we needed to get points on the board, or punt and pin 'em down there, so I was proud of that."

Ja'Marr Rebounds

Boy, did the Bengals ever try to get the ball to Chase Sunday afer his two-catch day in the opener.

Taylor and offensive coordinator Dan Pitcher said they would. Burrow targeted him nine times, got him seven times for two touchdowns and 75 yards, and what he called one of his top two career catches.

The Bengals broke open that scoreless game with 3:29 left in the first half on what Burrow called "an unbelievable," catch as Chase ran step for step down the right sidelines with his good friend and All-Pro Texans cornerback Derek Stingley Jr, mauling each other all the way. They collided at the front right pylon, Chase looked back, leaped, and somehow dragged his right toe across the turf before going out in the corner with a 32-yard touchdown catch.

"I thought he was falling down. I was about to argue for a pass interference, and then somehow, he stayed up and contorted his body and got two feet in. It was incredible,"  Burrow said.

The only other grab Chase said he would put in that category would be his acrobatic Super Bowl catch.

"I never really beat him. He was still over the top of me," Chase said. "I had to get into position, and Joe threw a good enough ball so the DB couldn't get to it."

Despite that throw and Burrow's run-and-wave-and gun throw to Chase for the 18-yard touchdown catch that made it 17-3 late in the third quarter, Burrow called his game "incredibly average."

Still, that was an All-Pro-MVP play because Burrow was about to be engulfed by two Texans just before he broke the pocket and waved Chase to the right across the back of the end zone.

"I was going that way, and he was running that way," Chase said.

It wasn't average at all. After nursing a tight back, Burrow gutted through a game where he was sacked five times and hit five more. But he never let the Texans' prolific edges get the upper hand. And a 105.2 passer rating with no turnovers is better than average against an elite defense in his first win against a DeMeco Ryans scheme.

"It's a little sore after the game, but no problems. There's a lot of people across this league playing with tight backs. No big deal." said Burrow, who only practiced full on Friday last week.

Fourth and Dex

Not much to the play that turned the game, Lawrence said of that fourth-and-one from the Bengals 18 as the clocked tickled under seven minutes in the first half.

"I was straight up on (the center)," Lawrence said. "I just put my head down and went forward."

Defensive tackle Jonathan Allen (another sack, three tackles for loss) wasn't on the field for that. "But I heard it."

"In my view, it wasn't a shift in the game, it was a nail in the coffin," said Bengals safety Bryan Cook of the stop that highlighted a 60-yard stoning of the Texans on the ground.

It was enough that in a late third quarter they trailed 10-3, Ryans opted to kick a field goal on fourth-and-one from the Bengals 40. But he doesn't have McPherson. The 58-yarder was short.

"That's what Dex does," Allen said. "The offense has to do so much to stop him, it opens it up for the rest of us."

Slants and Screens

Burrow said right tackle Amarius Mims "was lights out all day."

"I thank my quarterback for that," said Mims, who came out for a couple of snaps early when his shoe came off. …

Taylor pumped out game balls to his top tacklers, linebacker Demetrius Knight Jr., tying a career-high with 12, and cornerback Dax Hill, who went to town against the Texans' depleted receiver corps. He had 10 tackles and threw in a career-high four passes defensed …

Defensive end Shemar Stewart, making his season debut after missing all but two snaps of training camp with a hyperextended knee, racked up a sack in the dying moments.

"Communication with D-Knight," said Stewart, who then worked a game up front ...