With their backs against the playoff wall and hobbled with injuries, the Pittsburgh Steelers found a way to get past the hapless Cincinnati Bengals. The win pushes the Steelers record to 6-5 and keeps them in the mix for a playoff spot in the AFC with five games to play. Here are our big takeaways from the game.
A win is a win
At this point in the season, it is more about attrition than talent at times. Cincinnati is winless and racing to the No. 1 overall pick in the draft. They had nothing to play for. And that made them dangerous. But when you are the better team you have to find a way to win in spite of everything else. And that is exactly what the Steelers did. They won’t earn any style points but in the end how you win doesn’t matter.
Snell over Samuels worked
There was some question of running back Benny Snell Jr. would have the conditioning to be effective after missing a month of football with an injury. But credit to offensive coordinator Randy Fichtner for sticking with the hot hand instead of forcing the football to Jaylen Samuels.
Is it Duck time?
We will dig more into this but after watching Mason Rudolph struggle enough on Sunday to get himself benched and watching Devlin Hodges come in and minimize his mistakes and do enough for the Steelers to win, a quarterback controversy has to happen.
The defense came back strong
After their worst performance in more than a month, the Steelers bounced back to smother the Bengals offense. Pittsburgh found their way to create more timely turnovers and had Cincinnati quarterback Ryan Finley on the run all game long.
