Recapping Steelers nail-biting win over the Titans in Week 7

The Pittsburgh Steelers held the lead the entire game against the Titans in Week 7, but here’s how they were almost handed their first loss.

From the start of Pittsburgh’s Week 7 contest against the Tennessee Titans, if felt like a game that Mike Tomlin’s team was going to run away with. After scoring their first opening-drive touchdown in 23 games, it was all Steelers in the first half.

Pittsburgh received the ball first and marched down the field. Ben Roethlisberger’s first touchdown pass to James Conner was brought back due to an offensive facemask penalty, so the Steelers essentially scored twice on the first drive – their actual score coming from an 11-yard touchdown reception from Diontae Johnson.

After Pittsburgh’s defense immediately forced Tennessee off the field, Pittsburgh marched back down for another touchdown; this time it was a one-yard touchdown run by Benny Snell – making it a 14-0 game.

While the Titans soon answered back with a touchdown of their own after a tipped pass that was caught by Adam Humpries kept their drive alive, the Steelers would go on to rack up 24 points in the first half.

Unfortunately, the second half was an entirely different story. Pittsburgh’s offense stalled and managed just 3 points in the final two-quarters of play. In addition, a big missed tackle attempt by Minkah Fitzpatrick shifted the momentum as Titans receiver A.J. Brown scored on a 73-yard touchdown reception.

From there, it was mostly downhill for the Steelers. Tennessee scored 17 unanswered points to end the game. Eventually, kicker Stephen Gostkowski was given a shot to be the hero by sinking a field goal to send the game into overtime, but he missed the 45-yarder wide right. Thankfully, Pittsburgh was able to hang on to win, 27-24.

What went wrong for the Steelers in the second half?

There was a night and day difference between the Steelers in the first half compared to the second half – particularly on offense. Though the team will have a lot to discuss in the film room this week, much of the blame falls on the shoulders of Ben Roethlisberger.

While one of his turnovers was off a batted pass in this game, Roethlisberger clearly left some point on the board with some of his questionable (at best) decisions. The first came in the closing moments of the first half as he mistakenly tried to find Diontae Johnson deep in the endzone. The ball wasn’t close and was picked off by Tennessee – forcing the Steelers to miss out on what should have been a guaranteed 3 points before the half.

However, Ben’s biggest error came late in the fourth quarter. Leading the Titans 27-24, Roethlisberger made a colossal mistake trying to thread the needle to JuJu Smith-Schuster in triple coverage down the seem into the endzone, but the ball was picked off.

Had Ben done anything but turn the football over in this situation, the Steelers could have at least kicked a field goal and forced the Titans to score a touchdown in just minutes and change. Fortunately, Gostkowski missed the field goal to send the game into overtime.

As good as the first half looked for the Steelers, they really struggled in the second half, and the team will need to perform better next week as they get set to take on the Ravens in Baltimore. At the end of the day, a win is a win, and fans should be thrilled that this team is 6-0 right now.