"I've said this all season. They get paid too. Their guys are going to make plays, and that's why they are in the position they are in now," said middle linebacker Josh Bynes of the 11-3 Steelers. "And that happened. They were able to make plays, but even throughout all that, we can't let momentum swing their way.
"We've just got to come up with a play, come up with a stop or something like that to knock the wind out a little bit and give us back the ball to settle everything down, and I just think defensively we did such a great job today and guys played their butts off."
That's exactly what Bynes did Monday night on the biggest third-and-one of the game. It came late in the third quarter and the Bengals were bleeding. The Steelers had scored 10 straight, the Bengals had been six and out in the quarter but there was Bynes busting up the middle.
Bynes, the nine-year pro, didn't blink on a motion across the formation and with tackle Xavier Williams and Sam Hubbard standing up their linemen, Bynes barged through the hole to grab running back Benny Snell, Jr., by the ankles to force the punt. When the Steelers got the ball back, it was 24-10.
"It's just something we practice pretty much all week, and there's nothing like when the stuff you practice all week shows up in a game and you watch film and stuff like that," Bynes said. "I just made a good read and was just trying to make a great play for the team, and obviously it was a great stop for our team and actually a good kill for them and keep that thing going our way. I was just blessed to make that play, but yeah, that's it -- film study, practice, it all just came in that play."
The Bengals are chalking up those kinds of plays to just getting some kind of consistent lineups out there.
When the Steelers beat them, 36-10, back on Nov. 15, they were down three defensive coaches and had three cornerbacks for much of the game. Mike Daniels and Chase Covington have started the last eight games at nose tackle and defensive tackle, respectively, after three different combos started the first six weeks. And none of them was Atkins-Reader.
It was that familiarity that allowed defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo to show Big Ben a bevy of different looks. They only blitzed him ten times, about right for a team blitzing about 30 percent of the time. But they showed a variety or pressures, particularly loading the linebackers up in the A gap, before dropping people back. When slot cornerback Mackensie Alexander caught an interception basically thrown right at him over the middle, Roethlisberger seemed surprised eight men had draped across the field.
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