There are many ingredients necessary to win a championship. The obvious are talented players and great coaching. There is also a little bit of luck with regards to schedule and/or path to the championship.
Less obvious, though, is the "it" factor because "it" is so hard to quantify and identify. The "it" factor, though, seems to include intangibles like grit, mental toughness and the ability to handle pressure. It is the ability for a team to win a game when there is no logical reason it should have won.
That's precisely what the Steelers showed Sunday night in their 20-15 win against the Lions. If you look at the statistics and watched the game, there is no logical reason why the Steelers should have won. They were outplayed by the Lions and at times seemed powerless to stop them. The Steelers offense essentially made one huge play and didn't do much else, and the defense was on its heels the entire game.
But then again, the Steelers made every single play they needed to make when the game was on the line. That's especially true of the defense, which kept the Lions out of the end zone the entire game. The Lions had nearly 500 yards of total offense, and Matthew Stafford threw for 423, but they couldn't get those final few yards to finish drives.
A different Steelers player stepped up on just about every Lions play in the red zone. Detroit had to settle for five field goals and should have kicked two more but instead twice opted to try and go for it on fourth down. The Steelers bent all night long, but they never broke, and that shows a certain level of mental toughness.
The offense was sort of choppy all night. It never really got rolling, producing only 13 points through 42 minutes. At that point, the Steelers faced a third-and-9 from their own 3. That was a critical moment in the game because had they not converted the first down, they'd have punted the ball back to the Lions and given them excellent starting field position.
Most teams would probably have played it safe, ran the ball or thrown a short pass or wide receiver screen. The Steelers didn't do that, though, as Ben Roethlisberger dropped back and threw the ball down the field to JuJu Smith-Schuster. It was the perfect matchup for the Steelers as Smith-Schuster was covered by a linebacker who couldn't keep up with him and he ran all the way to the end zone for a 20-12 lead. It was a 97-yard pass play, and frankly, the play that changed the game.
That sequence changed the game as the Steelers got the ball deep in their own territory because the Lions, who were trailing 13-12 at the time, went for it on fourth down. The Steelers stuffed a Stafford quarterback draw and turned the ball over on downs. In essence, had the Steelers not made a play on defense on that fourth down, they would have been trailing 19-13 instead of leading 20-12. That may have been enough to change the outcome of the game.
Of course, as is always the case, the Steelers were a little bit lucky. Jim Caldwell didn't think about things and figure out that kicking a field goal and taking a lead in that spot was the right move. Caldwell got greedy and let that cloud his judgment. The Lions showed absolutely no ability to convert on short yardage downs the entire game. That's why it was a dumb decision to go for the touchdown, and I'd have said that even if they found a way to score.
The way the Lions defense was playing combined with their own lack of a running game and red zone issues means they should have taken the sure points. Had they kicked that field goal to take a 15-13 lead it would have set them up to be able to win the game with field goals even if the Steelers had eventually scored a touchdown to go up 20-15.
Again, the Steelers defense deserves all of the credit in the world and they made all the right plays at the right time, but they got some help from the Lions as well.
We've known the Steelers have enough talent and good enough coaching to win a championship since the preseason. That much wasn't in question. What we didn't know was whether or not they had that "it" factor, and Sunday they proved they absolutely do.
