Steelers crushing loss vs Bengals essentially dooms their 2022 season

The Pittsburgh Steelers desperately needed a win to keep their season alive, but the Bengals may have driven the final nail in the coffin with this one. 

This is not what Steelers fans had in mind. With their backs against the wall in a must-win game against the Cincinnati Bengals, Pittsburgh utterly dropped the ball. Their 37-30 loss in Week 11 likely spells the end of any potential return to relevancy during the 2022 season. Now at 3-7, it would take a miracle for the Steelers to get back into the hunt.

Things started out pretty encouraging. While Pittsburgh’s defense struggled to contain Joe Burrow from the gate, the offense might have played their best half of football in 2022 in the first two quarters against the Bengals. Despite not scoring more than 20 offensive points in a single game this season, Kenny Pickett was able to rally the troops to 20 first-half points in this one.

As a result, the Steelers entered the tunnel at halftime with a 20-17 lead. Sadly, it was all downhill from there.

The second half included a pretty strong start by Pittsburgh’s pass-rushers, as T.J. Watt and Alex Highsmith met at the quarterback for a big sack. The third quarter also included one of the most impressive interceptions you will ever see by Watt.

However, Pittsburgh’s defense did a lousy job containing Burrow and the Bengals offense down the stretch. When they needed a stop the most, they simply couldn’t come up with it, as Cincinnati marched the ball all the way down the field for a touchdown to put the game out of reach. Eventually, the Bengals would go on to win.

Steelers just aren’t good enough yet

Though Pittsburgh looked really encouraging at times, it’s very easy to tell that this team simply isn’t ready to compete with good NFL teams. Against the Bengals, Pickett finished with a remarkably underwhelming stat line of 25 /42 for 265 yards and a touchdown, via ESPN stats. This was even padded by some cheap underneath passes toward the end of the game when the contest was well out of reach.

As promising as the offense was in the first half, they were as disappointing as possible in the second half of the game. Pittsburgh’s offensive line crumbled late in the game and Dan Moore was humiliated by pass rusher, Trey Hendrickson. This was in addition to the collapse of Pickett down the stretch.

On the other side of the ball, Pittsburgh’s defense played one of their worst games of the season — even with both T.J. Watt and Minkah Fitzpatrick on the field. Surrendering 37 points on your own turf against a division rival is far from ideal.

This is one that the Pittsburgh Steelers would like to forget. There were a handful of good moments, but this team showed us that they just aren’t quite ready to compete with the big dogs. We hope that changes soon, but now with a record of 3-7, it’s going to be hard to find hope for the rest of the 2022 season.