The Pittsburgh Steelers had a plan against Lamar Jackson, Derrick Henry, and the Baltimore Ravens. They didn’t always execute that plan to its fullest effect—but the plan itself also didn’t work as intended. Indeed, suggests Ravens OLB Kyle Van Noy, what the Steelers wanted to do in setting up Lamar Jackson quite possibly may have backfired and had the opposite effect.
“The Steelers’ defense, they were like, ‘We want to get Lamar [Jackson] to run the ball. We want to see if he can last the football game running the ball and throwing the ball. Let’s see if we can take Derrick Henry out’”, he said on the McCoy and Van Noy podcast. “And, boy oh boy, was that a tough thing to do”.
Van Noy is talking about the Ravens’ read-option run game, with both Jackson and Derrick Henry big-time running threats. As they have in the past in similar situations, the Steelers attacked the running back as part of their strategy.
Rather than slow Jackson down, however, he had his best day running against the Steelers in his career. In all, he rushed for 81 yards on 15 carries as part of a record-setting day. Henry pounded the Steelers for another 186 yards as the Ravens finished with 299 collectively.
“Derrick’s been eating off the zone read, and that was the game plan, was, ‘Okay, let’s take away Derrick and let Lamar get tired’”, Van Noy said of the Steelers’ strategy. “But I feel like it got him into the game comfortably. It got him going, got him some good runs, had a good pull”.
He talked about one play in particular that he believed energized Lamar Jackson early. It was a tackle Minkah Fitzpatrick made in open space, but on which he couldn’t prevent a first down. “That was just a momentum booster for Lamar”, the Ravens edge rusher said. And the Steelers were left to deal with the consequences for the rest of the night.
Thanks to Henry, the Ravens didn’t need to lean on Jackson much. He only attempted 21 passes against the Steelers, but to great effect. He completed 16 for 175 yards and two touchdowns, protecting the football.
His inability to keep possession was his biggest problem in previous games against the Steelers. However, Jackson and the Ravens have protected the ball well in their past two meetings, and they have won both. Without splash plays as an equalizer, the Steelers were simply at the mercy of an elite offense.
Even Lamar Jackson knows he has had his hands full with the Steelers in the past. Prior to the past several weeks, he had never beaten them against a starting quarterback. Now the Ravens have beaten Russell Wilson head-to-head twice, and in the playoffs. And he looked at his most comfortable this last game—perhaps because the Steelers helped make him feel that way.
