Steelers out to avoid second straight loss in divisional round
Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger hopes to lead the Steelers to an AFC Divisional round playoff victory over the Chiefts tonight at Arrowhead Stadium.
Steelers running back Le’Veon Bell is looking to build on his strong start to the AFC playoffs tonight against Kansas City.
Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin watches as his team warms up Friday before practice.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The finality of losing a playoff game in a one-and-done situation was a harsh reality for the Steelers last season.
Getting so close to beating eventual Super Bowl champion Denver only to lose in the AFC Divisional playoffs has been a driving force for the team throughout the past year.
Now, on the cusp of playing another AFC Divisional playoff game at second-seeded Kansas City (12-4) Sunday, the third-seeded Steelers (12-5) have a chance at redemption. The game was moved back from a 1 p.m. start to 8:20 because of ice storms expected to hit the Kansas City area.
How much that inclement weather impacts the game remains to be seen. But the Steelers wouldn’t care if the game was played in Antarctica.
They’re just glad to still be playing.
“That offseason was a horrible offseason for so many players because we knew that we were so close to accomplishing a goal that we had last year and we didn’t,” said Steelers defensive end Stephon Tuitt. “We failed. I get goosebumps talking about it. To be back in this situation again, with everybody healthy, to do this all over again, it’s going to be an exciting football game.”
The Steelers went to Denver last year expecting to beat the Broncos despite not having running backs Le’Veon Bell and DeAngelo Williams or wide receiver Antonio Brown, who were injured the previous week in a Wild Card win over Cincinnati.
That confidence came from the fact they had beaten the Broncos in Pittsburgh, 34-27, just a month earlier. But the injuries – quarterback Ben Roethlisberger also was playing through a shoulder injury suffered against the Bengals – became too much to overcome, along with a fourth-quarter fumble by third-string running back Fitzgerald Toussaint in Denver territory with the Steelers trailing, 13-12.
The Steelers defeated the Chiefs, 43-14, in Week 4 and have Roethlisberger, Bell and Brown all healthy. That gives them plenty of confidence heading to Kansas City.
But they also know the results of that meeting in October in Pittsburgh means nothing this time.
If they needed any reminders of that, they need only look at their convincing 30-12 win over Miami last week. The Dolphins beat the Steelers, 30-15, in the regular season.
“It’s hard to beat a team twice,” said Steelers guard David DeCastro. “They’re going to be ready, just like we were ready last week for Miami. It’s a new week, a new game.”
You can bet that Kansas City head coach Andy Reid, who has a 16-2 record in the regular season and 3-0 mark in the playoffs when coming off a bye week, spent the past two weeks hammering his team about how it was beaten in that earlier meeting, much the same way Pittsburgh’s coaching staff did last week preparing for Miami.
“Pittsburgh did a great job against us. They got after us,” said Reid. “We respect the heck out of them. We’re just going back to the drawing board and see if we can compete against them.”
Few teams have of late. The Steelers have gone to a run-first mentality with Bell and it’s led to eight consecutive wins.
Bell has gained 1,002 rushing yards in his past seven games – he sat out the meaningless regular-season finale victory over Cleveland – including a team playoff-record 167 yards last week against Miami.
The Chiefs, however, know something about being hot. They won 11 consecutive games last season, starting with a 23-13 win over the Steelers at Arrowhead Stadium, a game in which Roethlisberger did not play because of injury, and have 23 victories in their past 28 games.
The Chiefs have done it by using an opportunistic defense to help an offense that ranked 20th in the NFL in total yardage. Kansas City led the NFL with eight touchdowns on returns, four on interceptions, one on a fumble, two on punts and one on a kickoff.
Kansas City led the NFL with 33 takeaways, despite ranking 24th in yardage against, including 26th against the run.
Roethlisberger threw two interceptions last week and has eight interceptions in eight road games.
“We have to do a better job of taking care of the ball,” said Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin. “It is January. You have to take care of the football. It’s catastrophic to your cause when it’s good-on-good, and let’s assume in January it’s good-on-good. It’s definitely going to be an issue. We are going into Kansas City. We are playing in their place. They are No. 1 in the NFL in creating turnovers and turnover ratio. We have some work to do in that area.”
But much like they have in the past two months, the Steelers will rely heavily on their offensive stars and a young, improving defense to try to extend their season at least another week.
“In the playoffs, your main guys need to show up,” said Tuitt. “They did that (last week). And for us, if they show up like that each week, they’re going to take us a long way. Defensively, our job is to make sure we get the ball back to our offense because we just have too much firepower for them to be sitting on the sideline. They can ring up points really quick.”
The Steelers hope that continues because they’re not ready to see this season end.
“No doubt,” said Steelers guard Ramon Foster. “I don’t want to say you use (last season) as fuel, but to know that it can happen that quick, everybody’s mindset is that they’re not ready to go home. This thing just now feels like it’s starting.
“There’s no reason to be in a hurry to leave. You use last year as a history lesson more than anything.”
Kansas City’s last home playoff win was a 27-24 overtime victory over the Steelers in a Wild Card game in 1994. The Chiefs are 0-4 at Arrowhead since and 1-9 in their past 10 playoff games. They have four playoff victories since winning the Super Bowl in 1970. … The Steelers are 15-9 in Divisional playoff games, including winning six of their past eight. … Pittsburgh’s 35 playoff wins since the 1970 NFL merger is the NFL record. … The Steelers are 5-4 in the playoffs against non-divisional opponents after winning the first meeting. … Steelers linebacker Ryan Shazier has an interception in three consecutive games.