When this passionate rivalry took an ugly turn on Saturday night, it was the Bengals who paid the biggest price.
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The biggest concern is the health of star receiver Antonio Brown, who departed Saturday night’s game with a concussion after a vicious hit by Bengals linebacker Vontaze Burfict. Although the Steelers had their fair share of negatives, the game came completely apart after Bengals players committed several infractions, including incidents with Steelers coaches Danny Smith and Mike Munchak. “So I went over to the sideline and said, ‘Coach you can’t do that anymore, I can’t throw it that far.’ We knew we had to work our way down the field”. Discipline, to me, is something that’s taught throughout the year. In the wild card playoff against Pittsburgh, the answer finally came out as Burfict and Jones combined to cost Lewis is first-ever postseason victory. Jones, Burfict and Porter are likely to be on that list. It was over, but then it wasn’t. “Vontaze is obviously a great player for us, and he’s done a lot of really good things”, Dalton said.
Then, Roethlisberger entered the field.
“This was a disgraceful performance by the Cincinnati Bengals”, said CBS analyst Boomer Esiason, the quarterback of Cincinnati’s 1988 Super Bowl team. To see someone hit him in the head like that and he be laid out like that and see people celebrate, I lost it at that point.
He entered the huddle with little to say.
The victory sends the Steelers to Denver for a 4:40 p.m. game next Sunday against the AFC’s top-seeded Broncos.
The Bengals meltdown occurred after Hill and receiver A.J. The final step was Pacman Jones’ unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in a scrum that followed the head-hunting. In the end, the Steelers prevailed 18-16.
According to ESPN, Burfict has an NFL-high 14 unnecessary roughness penalties since 2012 – none more costly than Saturday’s hit on Brown. “Your character comes out in those moments there”. With the Steelers up 15-0 in the fourth quarter, Roethlisberger hurt his right shoulder when Burfict sacked him, forcing him to the locker room. Jordan Berry was serviceable as a punter with three of seven punts downed inside the Bengals’ 20 yard-line. The Bengals managed just 56 yards of total offense yet trailed just 6-0 as the Steelers and the league’s third-ranked offense could muster only a pair of Boswell field goals.
Down 15-0 in the fourth quarter, the Bengals got an early touchdown to make it a 15-7 game. But, Jones’ first pass attempt from scrimmage was intercepted by Burfict and the controversial linebacker, who has candidly spoken about his hatred of the Steelers and their players, raced down the field and into the tunnel to celebrate what appeared to be the game-winning interception.
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On the first play of the clock-killing drive, Bengals running back Jeremy Hill, unthinkably fumbled the ball and the Steelers recovered it on their own 12-yard line. He was booed as he left the field. Roethlisberger told the coaches he could barely throw the ball longer than 10 yards. One of the highlight plays in this game was a spectacular catch by Martavis Bryant in the corner of the end zone that displayed an acrobat-like awareness of position and ball control for a touchdown. He snagged Roethlisberger’s pass above his head and, as he fell to the turf and the ball slipped, he brought it down around his backside and clasped it with both hands to his backside – touchdown!
