Steelers Notebook: Regular season has familiar finish against familiar foe

[Nolrog]

Well Cleveland, if you had beat the Ravens, it wouldn't have to be this way, but now the Steelers are forced to come in there and decimate you.

Can you smell the over confidence in the air?

--- Added 12/27/2010 at 10:12 AM ---

All game are won on the field.The steelers are going to play as if it's their first playoff game.The Browns are going to be playing their Superbowl.This game ,by no means,is going to be a pushover.
Area in which the steelers have to be careful.
1...............special teams,watch out for some long returns by Cribbs

2...............defensive pass interference penalties

3...............offensive holding penalties

The steeler do this , we win

4........ don't hit anyone from the opposing team anywhere above the belt, or we'll get called for helmet-to-helmet.
5........ Harrison just got called for one anyway and he wasn't even on the field.
6........ Cleveland just hit Ben a full 10 seconds after the play was over but the refs called it continuation.
7........ Harrison just got called for helmet-to-helmet again and the Steelers were on O.

[coach]

Ditto on the h2h hits. I see flags from the refs being a potential problem in a game of this magnitude. The refs will have been primed by the league office to call the game extremely tight given the head shots last time they met. Let's hope that is not the case.

As far as the game goes, McCoy sucked against the rats (his worst game this year) so he will be motivated to redeem himself and end on a positive note.

Hopefully the bungles have some fight left in em after all the celebartions from their win this week.

[Moondog]

Everybody's giving Cleveland too much credit. Colt only got his yardage last time because the Steelers were up by eighteen points and went into prevent mode and when the Browns scored to make it an eleven point game, Pittsburgh hung another TD on them. Pittsburgh will be out for blood, people underestimate that. I have faith that the Steelers will take care of business. I am confident that the Steelers are not going to take this game lightly in any way shape or form. I am also confident that my own confidence in this team has no effect on the outcome of this upcoming game. I'll say it again...the Steelers will decimate the Browns.

* On a side note, I think the Ravens have the tougher game on sunday anyway, the Bengals are playing better ball than the Browns at the moment.

[steelersbabex25]

Everybody's giving Cleveland too much credit. Colt only got his yardage last time because the Steelers were up by eighteen points and went into prevent mode and when the Browns scored to make it an eleven point game, Pittsburgh hung another TD on them. Pittsburgh will be out for blood, people underestimate that. I have faith that the Steelers will take care of business. I am confident that the Steelers are not going to take this game lightly in any way shape or form. I am also confident that my own confidence in this team has no effect on the outcome of this upcoming game. I'll say it again...the Steelers will decimate the Browns.

* On a side note, I think the Ravens have the tougher game on sunday anyway, the Bengals are playing better ball than the Browns at the moment.

I'll admit, I haven't watched many Browns games this season. But if I'm going off of just what I saw in the Ravens game, Colt McCoy is absolutely dreadful. He has the same problem that Ben has in that he overthrows his recievers often, except he does it when there's someone behind the reciever to make the interception. Even with our secondary, we should be able to pick him apart.

[SteelDad]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Cribbs out or at the very least way less than 100%? Pretty sure I read that last week. Either way, the formula is simple.

-Pressure McCoy. (He threw 3 picks to the Ravens)
-Stop the Run. (I think we sometimes take it for granted just how good we are against it)
-Solid special teams.
-no turnovers

[Steelers_All_Day_43]

The 13-6 loss last year was the worst game...EVER

[LatrobePA]

Their center was talking shit on Harrison after last game, as if they needed more ammo!!

[Real Deal Steel]

I say we give young Colt the Payton Manning treatment. Let him see things that are not there after the ball is snapped. Colt threw for 289 against us and that upset me big time. I don't like rookies getting comfortable against our defense.

[Scorp]

The Steelers already have clinched a playoff berth, but for them, the road to the Super Bowl goes through ... Cleveland?

Yes, Cleveland, which is again on the outside watching others fight or prepare for their playoff berths for the seventh consecutive season. Cleveland, which finished last in the division six of the past seven seasons. Cleveland, on the verge of a possible coaching change for the fourth time in the past seven years.

It's that same Cleveland, which knocked the Steelers out of the playoffs last season with a stunning 13-6 upset victory at home.

"We went up there and laid an egg," Steelers defensive end Brett Keisel recalls of that bitterly cold, windy December Thursday night in Cleveland. "We're not trying to do that again."

The stakes are more vital this time.

The difference between winning and losing in Cleveland for the Steelers may be the difference between having a clear path to the AFC championship game and having little chance of coming near it.

The game Sunday in Cleveland means everything. To put it in simple terms, here is the difference for the Steelers between beating the Browns and earning the No. 2 seed in the conference and losing and having to go on the road as a wild-card playoff team:

A win -- The Steelers have off Jan. 8/9 and open play at home Jan. 15/16 for the right to advance to the AFC championship game, which also could be at home if New England loses.

A loss -- The Steelers would make plans for a road trip Jan. 8/9 probably at Kansas City, for the right to play on the road again Jan. 15/16 at New England, for the right to advance to the AFC championship game on the road.

See?

It's not just the extra week's rest they would earn with the bye, but the free pass into the next round and a guaranteed home game.

"It's huge for us," said Casey Hampton. "We definitely need it. If you get a bye, it gets you closer to the Super Bowl. You only have to win two games instead of three. Anything can happen in the playoffs so you want to play as least games as possible trying to get there."

The week's rest and extra time to heal -- and to avoid further injury by playing an extra playoff game -- also are important.

"It's big, it's big," Keisel said. "Some time off, that's what we're fighting for, to get that bye. We have one more game to do it and the ball's in our hands."

There has been no word yet on whether Troy Polamalu, who has missed the past two games with an injury around his Achilles tendon, will play in Cleveland; defensive captain James Farrior said Monday "It doesn't look good, but you never know." If he does not and the Steelers win, Polamalu will have had a month off before he will have played.

"We have a lot of key guys banged up," said Bryant McFadden, himself one of them with a lingering issue with a hamstring. "That gives us an extra week of just practicing and you don't have to worry about going into a four-quarter ballgame on that Sunday. And you get a chance to get guys feeling a lot better for next week."

The Steelers, of course, have gone the wild-card route successfully. In 2005, they became the first team to win three playoff games on the road and then win a Super Bowl. That the New York Giants turned the same trick two years later does not make that route in vogue.

"Not too many teams get a chance to go the way we did," said McFadden, also part of that 2005 Super Bowl team. "We needed our last four games to win just to get in. We used that as a rhythm and continued to play good football and get to that Super Bowl -- '08 was a different route."

The Steelers had the No. 2 seed in '08 and played two games to reach the Super Bowl at home after top-seed Tennessee was upset.

If the Steelers have to go the wild-card route this time, not only would it be a psychological and physical blow to them, but they won't be entering the playoffs on a roll as they did in '05. They will go having lost two of their final three, including their last one to Cleveland.

"We want to clinch the second seed and our division," LaMarr Woodley said. "We have to take care of Cleveland. Last year, when we played Cleveland down there, they took care of business on us. We have to make sure that doesn't happen this year."



Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10362...#ixzz19QZqR9te

[Steelers_All_Day_43]

We can't afford to lose and become a wild card