The Pittsburgh Steelers aren’t just aiming for AFC North superiority anymore. After starting 7-2 and coming off a big win over an impressive Washington Commanders team, they are now aiming for conference superiority. Currently, the conference runs through the Kansas City Chiefs, but according to Ben Roethlisberger, the Steelers are gaining ground on them.
“I think this puts us in a closer level to the Chiefs,” Roethlisberger said via his Footbahlin’ podcast on YouTube. “Because we’re a three-phase football team. We have all three phases that are really clicking right now, and what Russ [Wilson] is doing is kind of taking the offense with his confidence to another level, and I think we are just going to continue to see it. Obviously, he’s playing well right now, and that’s what we wanna continue to see, and I think you’re gonna see the offense continue to grow. We had a little more trouble running the ball this week, but we showed that we can then throw the ball to make some things happen.”
The defense and special teams have already proven their capabilities over the first several weeks. The offense needed to gain some ground to show that the Steelers could be a three-phase team. With Wilson, they have done just that.
Since Wilson took over as the starter, the Steelers have averaged 30.3 points and 382.3 yards per game. If you measure that against other teams’ averages around the league for the full season, the Steelers would have the fourth-best total offense and the third-best scoring offense. That obviously will need to be proven over a much larger sample before they can start being labeled as a top-five or even ten offense, but it is a positive trend now.
The Chiefs may be undefeated, but they don’t look unbeatable by any measure. Recently, they have had a few games that came down to the wire, including a walk-off field goal block to win on Sunday against the Denver Broncos.
Even with the slow start on offense to begin the year, the Steelers are just one spot behind the Chiefs in total scoring on offense. They aren’t that far ahead in yards gained, either. I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if the Steelers entered their Christmas Day matchup against the Chiefs with a better offense in both total scoring and yards gained.
Until they beat the Chiefs, nobody will be fully convinced they can do it. They will have that opportunity in a month and a half on Christmas in the friendly confines of Acrisure Stadium.
