The Pittsburgh Steelers find themselves licking their wounds after a suffering a brutal 24-10 defeat at the hands of the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday at Acrisure Stadium. The 2-10 Cardinals came into Pittsburgh and looked like the better team for most of the game, establishing the running game while keeping Pittsburgh out of the end zone until garbage time, stuffing the Steelers at the 1-yard line on 4th down in the second quarter.
Former Steelers DL Chris Hoke, during his weekly appearance on the KDKA Extra Point postgame show, said that the Cardinals beat the Steelers at their own game.
“Devastating,” Hoke said about the loss. “This was supposed to be a stretch where they’re playing the Cardinals and going on playing teams that have these [bad] records. They come in and lay an egg on their home turf against a team that brought in a bunch of rookie starters on the defense. It was a devastating loss. They had 100 yards rushing in the second half, the Cardinals. That’s called bully ball. That cannot happen against a Pittsburgh Steelers defense.”
Arizona was supposed to be the first game of four favorable games on Pittsburgh’s upcoming schedule to close out the season, starting with 2-10 Arizona followed by the 2-10 Patriots, the 7-5 Colts, and the 5-6 Cincinnati Bengals. There were many in the national media thinking that Pittsburgh could run the table over the next month, improving to 11-4 with two games left to go, setting up an epic showdown against the Baltimore Ravens in Week 18 for the division crown.
The reality is that Pittsburgh may just be focused on keeping its head above water after last week’s catastrophe, losing to one of the worst teams in the league at home while looking inferior to Arizona both on offense and defense. The Steelers shot themselves in the foot against the Cardinals with untimely penalties, lack of execution in scoring range, and turnovers, like C Mason Cole’s botched snap to QB Mitch Trubisky. To add injury to insult, QB Kenny Pickett injured his ankle and will reportedly have surgery with a two- to four-week recovery period, leaving Pittsburgh without its starting quarterback for most of the rest of the season.
The Cardinals were the more dominant team on Sunday, boasting a strong running game headlined by RB James Conner. He had a heroic performance in his return to Pittsburgh, going over 100 rushing yards and two scores. Arizona’s defense was also stiff throughout the game, giving up some yardage between the 20s, but keeping Pittsburgh from getting on the board, much like Pittsburgh has done to its opponents this season.
Pittsburgh now goes from being in the driver’s seat to making the playoffs to now being in a bind. The Steelers have to press hard to avoid another slip up in the coming weeks, which could take them out of postseason contention altogether. They will try to get back on track on a short week with the Patriots on Thursday night, relying on Trubisky to lead them to getting back into the win column.
