Coming into the Week 10 matchup against the Green Bay Packers, the Pittsburgh Steelers were largely struggling in the ground game from a blocking perspective.
Those struggles showed up time and time again in the yards before contact Steelers running backs Najee Harris and Jaylen Warren had each and every week. Entering Week 10 against Green Bay, the Steelers were way down near the bottom of the league in yards before contact. In fact, Pittsburgh ranked 28th entering the matchup in yards before contact.
Harris averaged just 1.84 yards before contact on the season, while Warren averaged 2.5 yards before contact coming into the matchup. Those were lowly numbers.
On Sunday against the Packers, those numbers skyrocketed.
According to Pro Football Reference, Harris averaged 5.1 yards before contact on the ground against Green Bay, rushing for 82 yards and a touchdown on 16 carries. Warren, on the other hand, averaged 6.7 yards before contact on the day, rushing for a career-high 101 yards and a touchdown on 15 carries.
As a team, Pittsburgh averaged 3.6 yards per carry before contact, according to ESPN Packers reporter Rob Demovsky, which nearly doubled the output Pittsburgh averaged per game entering the matchup. It was also the second-most yards before contact the Steelers have had in the last three seasons, per ESPN Stats and Info.
That number alone shows just how dominant the Steelers’ rushing attack was against the Packers.
Yards before contact is pretty straightforward in football, but for future explanation this should clear it up: Yards before contact is the number of yards that a player was able to gain before being contacted by a member of the opposing team, per Pro Football Reference.
On Sunday against the Packers, Pittsburgh’s running back duo of Harris and Warren had some massive lanes to run through. The offensive line dominated from start to finish, moving guys off their spot throughout, opening up tractor-trailer sized lanes to run through as the run game carved up the Packers’ defense, which came into the Week 10 matchup top 10 in run defense.
That’s not the case anymore, and that’s a testament to the work the offensive linemen put in, winning their matchups throughout the afternoon, as well as the running backs taking advantage of the major rushing lanes to rip off big runs consistently.
After struggling for much of the year, the run game looks to be rounding into form at the right time for the Black and Gold. Look out.
