The Pittsburgh Steelers had 1st and goal at the 7-yard line eight minutes into the second quarter. That was as good as things would get, the game tied 3-3 at the time. Two plays later, QB Kenny Pickett suffered an ankle injury that was addressed surgically a day later. Five minutes of game time after that, the Arizona Cardinals flipped the script.
Their defense forced a stop at the goal line on fourth down, and their offense proceeded to march down the field in stops and starts, finally finding the end zone and securing a lead that they would never relinquish. Mentally, that’s tough to recover from, as we saw. Especially the way the Cardinals did it.
“I honestly think we were prepared. Plays were there to be made, we just didn’t do a good job of executing on third down”, OLB Alex Highsmith told reporters yesterday, via the team’s website. “Especially on that 99-yard drive, they took advantage of us on that drive because we couldn’t get off the field on third down”.
On paper, it was a 15-play, 99-yard drive on which they picked up five first downs. In reality, it actually took 109 yards due to a penalty, and the remarkable thing is that they recorded exactly zero first downs on first or second down.
The defense forced Arizona into third down five times on the drive, and it converted every time. 3rd and 3 from the 8—A 21-yard completion over the middle. 3rd and 6 from the 29—a 19-yard run off right guard. 3rd and 6 from the Steelers’ 44—a 17-yard completion over the deep middle. 3rd and 5 from the 22, after overcoming a holding penalty—another 15-yarder to the tight end, Trey McBride.
You know the name. He caught eight passes during the game for 89 yards and the touchdown that ended that drive. By rights he probably had a touchdown on 2nd and goal from the 5 before it was overturned. So he just got the touchdown on the next play—on third down.
“That drive was definitely really deflating”, Highsmith admitted. “I feel like we were making progress getting off the field on third downs and stuff like that, but having a drive like that is definitely deflating. We’ve just got to be a lot better getting off the field on third down”.
Overall, the Cardinals converted 10 of 17 tries on third down for a 59-percent success ratio, of which half of those conversions came on the most pivotal drive at the end of the first half. They scored two more touchdowns on their next four possessions in the second half and then closed out the game’s final 4:25 without allowing the Steelers, trailing by 14 after a late Diontae Johnson touchdown, to get the ball back.
The Steelers had been allowing a successful conversion on 37.9 percent of their opportunities, good for 13th in the league. They’re now down to 40 percent on the season from just one game, falling down to a tie for 19th. If it not for a top-10 red-zone defense, this team would easily have a losing record, so the defense had better inflate itself in a hurry.
