Remaining Wilbur Marshall putting the claps on Lorenzo White and we'll be back with the field goal attempt in a moment Coming up at 24 yard attempt by Ian Hohfield Before the season is 12 for 16 He hit from 24 earlier in the half Greg Montgomery the new holder replacing Frank Mayaki who was dropped the other day seven seconds to go in his first half Yes, the kick is put right through The Bobby Hohfield one-time kicker for the Jets and the Broncos back in the 70s Able to connect on two out of two and Houston has taken a 6-3 lead Gibbs yesterday remember what he told us he has lost more games before the half. You're looking at him He knows they gave the ball up. They knows he's got he's down by three. There is not a happy man told us yesterday Mars When we were talking about not taking the time us they were at midfield. He said we're gonna control a ball I want to have control of the football at the half If it's two minutes to go, I still want to control a ball whether I score or not. It's not important And they said what was the last week He took some criticism and he felt that The criticism wasn't fair because his philosophy has been do not give the opposition that emotional swing Do not give them the crack at getting the ball back. So normally he plays it very conservatively as it turned out here today He's picked off by Lamar Latham It leads to the Houston Drive and they're able to cash in and take the 6-3 lead right before halftime final seconds So that is the way this first half comes to a close Houston with a 6-3 lead on Washington We'll be back to Bob Costas after this word from the NFL and a message from your local station. This is the Domino's Pizza NFL live halftime report brought to you by Domino's Pizza. Nobody knows like Domino's how you like pizza at home Okay, Bob Costas with Will McDonough and Bill Parcells here in the studio in New York We welcome those of you who watched the first half of the Patriots and the Bills and of course those of you who've watched The Oilers and the Redskins. It's 6-3 in both games the Oilers with the lead at RFK Let's go to the sidelines there and rejoin OJ Simpson for his thoughts on the first half juice Well Bob, you know out here They were saying that this is going to be the preview of this year's Super Bowl It was more like the review in the first quarter of last year's Super Bowl With the Redskins keeping the Oilers high-powered offense off the field But the Oilers made a very interesting adjustment in the second quarter What Washington was doing is playing a very deep zone. You can't even see their safeties on your TV screen They're playing so far back Their linebackers were active at the line of scrimmage when the ball was snapped they were running way back What they were keeping Houston from doing was completing that 20-yard pass to their wide receivers I think Moon only threw two passes in the whole first half over 20 yards What Houston did at that point is they started using Lorenzo White I think he's been the most valuable player in the first half He made some great blocks, great pickups And what he started doing was running those little option passes out of the backfield A couple of screen passes and that has forced Washington to bring their linebackers up now So I expect in the second half Moon will be able to throw the ball 20 yards in, 20 yards out to his wide receivers So it's up to Washington to make the adjustment now Okay, thanks a lot. The second field goal for the Oilers, of course, came after the Lamar-Latham interception Prior to that, both field goal drives were 17-play affairs Washington held the ball for 10-36 before Lowmiller connected from 21 Then going 81 yards in 17 plays, holding it for 9-38 before Howe Field of Houston tied it at three And then off the turnover, Houston is able to take the lead 6-3 just before halftime. Bill? Both teams trying to get something established, Washington quite obviously with a running game And Houston, as O.J. said, with a short pass to the backs I agree that Houston did make that adjustment with O.J., that O.J. was talking about But I don't think Washington is going to change too much Don't forget, Oilers high-powered offense, now they only have six points Washington's playing pretty just about the way they want to defensively Willie? All the along people have said, how good is Houston? Well, they always said, how good is the Houston defense? And I think you've seen it here today, they're playing a high-powered team and they're playing very well Yeah, we've heard about Richie Pettibone as the defensive coordinator for the Redskins Jim Eddy has to be pleased with the work of his group for the Houston Oilers today Well, they've done what they had to do in this game, is put a lot of people in the face of Mark Griffin Alright, let's take a look at some of the other scores from around the league Both Detroit and Chicago are 6-2, they're tied for the lead in the NFC Central And it's the Lions with the lead in this game at halftime, 10-3, 20 mile per hour wins Below zero windchill at Soldier Field, the Lions with the lead by a touchdown In the game, some of you are watching, Buffalo, which has won 15 consecutive games at home And 30 of their last 32 at Rich Stadium, leading by only a score of 6-3 over the Patriots Now, the Bills average 40 points a game this year at home But Joe Collier's defense for the Patriots hasn't allowed more than 24 points in the game And the 3-5 Patriots have been competitive in almost every game they've played And they're within a field goal at intermission in this one San Francisco has the lead at Atlanta late in the second quarter, 7-0 Steve Young threw a 97-yard touchdown pass to John Taylor It's the longest touchdown play from scrimmage in the league this year He threw it from the end zone, Taylor caught it around the 50 between two defenders One of whom was the former 49er Tim McKire Then Deion Sanders trailing the play, couldn't catch Taylor from behind Chris Miller has bruised ribs, he's gone out at quarterback for the Falcons Billy Joe Tolliver is in, and the Niners lead 7-0 In the battle of Ohio, Cleveland has the lead at Cincinnati 14-10 Late in the second, Harold Green, the young running back for the Bengals, 9 carries For 106 yards already Green Bay and the Jets, a tie just snapped there on an O'Brien touchdown pass to Chris Burkett So the Jets have the lead, 13-6 And Tampa Bay has a halftime lead at the Metrodome over the Vikings On a 49-yard field goal by Steve Christie The score there is 3-0 in favor of the Bucs We're back to talk with Bill Parcells about football superstitions As NFL Live halftime activities continue right after this message from your local stations NFL Live halftime report, brought to you by Domino's Pizza, nobody knows like Domino's how you like pizza at home Okay, with Bill Parcells, Bob Costas back at our NFL Live studios in New York Now with Halloween still a recent memory, we thought it might be an appropriate time to discuss football and superstition For all his meticulous attention to detail and hard work, Parcells here incorporated a fair amount of superstition into his coaching We'll start now by hearing from Bill's former defensive coordinator, now the Browns head coach, Bill Belichick In Bill's office, he had a lot of elephants in his office on his desk And their trunks were all turned a certain way, towards the door, towards the window, I don't know, whatever brought him good luck And Bill did things routinely and when those routines worked, then he would stay with them So if we didn't practice on Saturday and then won the game, you could bank on the fact that next Saturday we wouldn't practice Think most coaches and players are like that, they have some kind of superstition? Oh I think so, a lot of the players never claimed to have any But I always noticed that they used to call to my attention the fact that we were digressing from what had been the norm Especially if things were going well, so deep down we had a few closet guys that had the same superstitions I had The only ones that used to bother me, and you'd hear about them in football, baseball, whatever the sport Is when a guy had a certain garment and he did well and then he wouldn't wash it Which is bad enough in baseball where you play every day, but in football where you play week to week The guy's going six, seven weeks, you know, with a pair of socks, I don't care, it's got to change Well we never had those, but we did, we would wear the same stuff, but it was sent to the dry cleaner Well that's reassuring, for more on Bill's attention for superstition, again, we go back to Bill Belichick Who would be the first guy in the locker room or where he would sit in the locker room Probably who he stood next to in the national anthem, I think that was a big thing When the wrong guy stood to him, he clubbed him over the head and told him to get out of the way Because he wasn't supposed to be standing there, you know, stuff like that He had a lot on his mind then, during the year Bill could keep track of a lot of things, a lot more than I could Did you have an assistant in charge of superstitions, a guy with a clipboard, keep track of them? No, it's just the coaches and the players got to know them, you know, you don't pick up pennies with the heads up And that sideline thing, for a number of years I had my captain always stand next to me on the side of Harry Carson He couldn't win a coin toss, so I knew every time I sent him out from there we were going to lose the toss You know, we had a little advantage, we could plan ahead Step on a crack, you know, break a witch's back Now, we dug into our archives and found this tape of Parcells talking about yet another of his superstitions Cats, black cats, poor cats in general You know, if they cross in front of you, you can erase them Do you know how to do that? No Well, you drive your car over where he was and then you back up and then you drive back over and then he doesn't count after that Well, just to make you feel at home here on the set, between cats and pachyderms, there you go Well, you have to point this trunk toward the door The trunk has to be up and he has to be facing the door And that brings you good luck Well, with any luck at all, NFL Live halftime activities will continue Please stay with us Welcome back to Washington, D.C. Marv Albert with Paul McGuire Houston leading Washington at the half by the score of 6-3 Now, the Redskins have certainly handled the run-and-shoot of the Houston Oilers Although the trailing in the game But all year long we've seen the Redskins succeed by making the proper halftime adjustments It's going to be the team that's going to win the game It's going to be the team that's going to win the game It's going to be the team that's going to win the game But the Redskins succeed by making the proper halftime adjustments It's going to be the team that wins this game It's the one that makes that adjustment at halftime You keep in mind here that the Redskins are giving up 12 points a game on the average And Houston 13 Now, one has six, Houston, and the other one three It is that adjustment that has to be made And that's one thing that we're going to watch closely The Redskins also have been handling the run-and-shoot by going, for the most part, with the 4-3 alignment Most unusual Yeah, it really is They have a lot of personnel on defense and everybody's questioning, say, the speed in their secondary Well, they're not showing it today They're going in there with five defensive backs Sometimes just three down linemen and three linebackers But most of the time they're playing with, even in long situations, third and long with only two linebackers And that's great Let's take a look at the halftime stats brought to you by Keystone Light And you can see time of possession Washington with that long drive that went 17 plays It took 10 and a half minutes, but Houston able to bounce back And they had a 17-play drive that led to a field goal We talked about some stats And time of possession really doesn't mean anything Unless it's what you do at the time of possession, okay? But when we went into this game, and Marv at the top, when you talked about how close these two teams are together In time of possession in the game, they're both averaging about 32 minutes a game Something has to give Because it comes out to 64 I figured you'd go with the new math to come up with that Unless there is an overtime Now it can work out Good point Ian Howfield getting set to kick off That is the deep man, Brian Mitchell Ricky Irvin's also back Lowmiller, 21-yard field goal And then Howfield hitting from 24 And 24 for a 6-3, Houston lead A reminder at the conclusion of today's game We'll be presenting the Avis We Try Harder Award Which will be given to the game's most valuable player Warren Moon, 15 for 25, 144 yards in the first half While Washington kept it on the ground due to the success of Ernest Beiner And Ripon throwing 10 times, 5 for 10 for 33 yards Beiner, 11 carries, 56 yards Bouncing back from last Sunday night against the Giants And the second half is underway This is Mitchell Good coverage by the Oilers Let's take a look at the Hertz 10-minute ticker Detroit with a 10-3 lead on Chicago Buffalo having a difficult time 6-3 in front of New England at the third They felt they'd have some time with New England New England's got a super defense Now 14-13, Cleveland lead And the Jets with a 13-6 advantage on Green Bay It was a push down at the 17-yard line Now the Redskins are a little bit different at the start of the second half They're coming out in the first half, they played two wide receivers, two tight ends Now they're coming out with a different package Which Jim Eddy calls 3-1-1 Which is three wide receivers, one tight end Which will be Middleton And one running back, which is Biner And Russ Grimm remaining in a right tackle for the injured Joe Dacote Off the play action Mark Mark Stopped by Chris Dishman Well, Mark Griffin over the years has been a hard hit by injury Take a look at this profile 86 injured reserve, 87 the same, 88 the shoulder kept him out But today his ninth consecutive start Which is good news for the Redskins