A weekly series I do that captures the forgotten and hidden plays that helped the Pittsburgh Steelers win or lose. Not the touchdowns, turnovers, or plays that will make the Monday morning highlights – the little ones that, looking back, played a key role in the outcome. I’ll start with a hidden moment that helped the Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Cleveland Browns 23-9 in Week 6.
Queen Takes Pawn
The Cleveland Browns spent the first half doing a lot of nothing. Frankly, both teams did. Pittsburgh kicked three field goals as neither defense budged much. Classic AFC North slug-it-out type of game. But the Browns got going late in the half, a death-by-papercut two-minute drill that pushed the ball close to the Steelers’ goal line.
Starting from the Browns’ 15 with 3:31 left in the second quarter, rookie QB Dillon Gabriel moved Cleveland to Pittsburgh’s 13. The Browns got aggressive, not satisfied with just a field goal, and with no timeouts, rolled the dice by putting the offense back on the field with seven seconds left. It wasn’t hard to know where the ball was going. To the end zone and with haste. Literally, there was no time to waste.
Patrick Queen knew it. Struggling in coverage this year, he made the play. Following trusted TE David Njoku down the seam, Queen dove and broke up this pass in the end zone.
It helps that Njoku seemingly got his head around late for this football. Maybe he doesn’t catch it regardless of what Queen does. But like many plays in this series, I’ll file under the “glad I didn’t need to find out” category.
Cleveland’s tape indicated that’s where the ball was going. Rewind to Week 5 against the Minnesota Vikings and the Browns attempted something similar before the half. Vertical seams are their go-to.
With the clock almost to zero, Kevin Stefanski waved the white flag and sent out the field goal team to make it 9-3 at half. Touchdown or field goal, still a one-possession game, but 9-3 versus 9-7 is a different feel. Especially knowing Cleveland was getting the ball to start the second half.
Queen’s play has dovetailed with the rise of this Steelers defense the last three weeks. He’s playing among the best football of his career and was all over the field yesterday. Run game, screen game, and in coverage – where he’s typically struggled – Queen is playing the football Pittsburgh paid him to produce.
In a relatively comfortable win over Cleveland, there isn’t quite the Eureka hidden play there’s been for other games. Nick Herbig’s first sack as the Browns were again on Pittsburgh’s doorstep was also key, though arguably a little more memorable.
Even for bad offenses like the Browns’, it’s hard to hold teams out of the end zone for 60 minutes. Through six weeks entering Monday night’s doubleheader, it’s happened only 11 other times. It accounts for less than seven percent of NFL games. Pittsburgh did so for the first time at home since 2019 and Queen’s play to force Cleveland to settle for three helped the cause.
