The Steelers did not celebrate their 21-16 victory against Minnesota yesterday so much as they lit candles afterward.
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Dewayne Washington consoles Vikings wide receiver Cris Carter, who thought he had caught the go-ahead touchdown with 1:58 remaining. But the play was negated because backup quarterback Todd Bouman crossed the line of scrimmage. (Lake Fong, Post-Gazette) |
That's what happens when you get the daylight scared out of you.
What had the looks of a Steelers rout at 21-3 midway through the fourth quarter nearly turned into a stunning Vikings victory.
"We let our guard down," safety Lee Flowers said. "I think we got comfortable when we saw it was 21-3. It was scary."
Two touchdowns in a three-minute span, and then a fumble by Kordell Stewart at the Steelers' 10 put Minnesota in position to win the game in the final two minutes.
No team wants a game to come down to a final pass to All-Pro Randy Moss in the end zone, but Dewayne Washington did what fellow cornerback Chad Scott could not do all game long. He not only had Moss covered in the corner, the ball underthrown by backup quarterback Todd Bouman hit him in the back and fell harmlessly to the grass.
"I knew that once he lined up on my side that they were going to throw the ball up to him," said Washington, who at 6 feet is four inches shorter than Moss.
That fourth-down-play from the 20 gave the Steelers the ball with 1:43 left and this time the offense did not fumble away the opportunity. Chris Fuamatu-Ma'afala, playing for injured Jerome Bettis, ripped off a 46-yard run on third down to end the drama.
"We started shaking our heads," Hines Ward said of the reaction on the sideline before the pass to Moss fell incomplete. "We had control of the game. We need to find a way to finish teams off a little better than what we did today."
Nevertheless, they hoisted their record to 9-2, best in the AFC after the Oakland Raiders lost in overtime to Arizona. The Vikings fell to 4-7 and virtually out of the playoff running. And, as Coach Bill Cowher liked to point out, this might have been the kind of game the Steelers would have lost in the past few years, such as how the Eagles beat them in overtime after tying the score with 10 points in the final 2:29 last year.
"Maybe some things are bouncing our way this year," Cowher said. "Maybe good luck is falling our way in some respects."
The Steelers had cruised to a 21-3 lead on touchdown runs of 1 yard by Bettis, 12 by Troy Edwards on an end-around and 4 by Amos Zereoue. Gary Anderson's 25-yard field goal were the lone points scored by the Vikings.
When safety Brent Alexander intercepted his second pass of the day with 8:27 left, the game seemed over. It was, until rookie Michael Bennett took a screen pass and ran 80 yards untouched for a Minnesota touchdown with 6:29 left.
The Steelers went into a turtle offense at that point to run time off the clock, but they could not make a first down with Fuamatu-Ma'afala running three consecutive times because Bettis was on the sideline with a hip injury.
Back came the Vikings. Moss burned Scott for a 62-yard go route from Bouman, who replaced Culpepper early in the quarter because of a knee injury. Bouman went back to Moss for a 12-yard touchdown with 3:22 left.
Bouman's pass fell incomplete on the 2-point conversion try, so the Vikings trailed by five.
Stewart, on the next series, went back to pass and guard Oliver Ross was pushed into him by defensive tackle Chris Hovan. Stewart fumbled and end Talance Sawyer recovered for the Vikings at the 10.
Bouman cut that in half with a 5-yard pass to Moss. Chris Carter threw a block too early on the next play and was called for pass interference that put the ball back on the 15.
Saftey Myron Bell might have saved the game on the next play. Bouman sprinted to his right, stopped and threw left to halfback Doug Chapman. Bell was charging toward the quarterback on the play and if he had kept going, no one would have stopped Chapman. But Bell sensed something was wrong, turned around and ran back toward Chapman. He was able to tackle him for a 4-yard loss just as he caught the pass.
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Jerome Bettis rushes for 81 yards before leaving the game with a hip injury. Bettis passed the 1,000-yard mark for the eighth time in his career. (Peter Diana, Post-Gazette) | |
"I just had a feel for it," Bell said. "If you're blitzing and the guy doesn't pick you up, you have to sense something."
On the next play, Bouman completed a pass to Carter in the end zone. Trouble was, Bouman ran 4 yards past the line of scrimmage before he threw it and the penalty moved the ball back to the 20 with a loss of down, setting up the Vikings' final chance to go ahead that fell incomplete.
"We don't have that killer instinct," Bettis said. "We have to have that killer instinct."
Bettis led everyone with 81 yards rushing before the hip injury he had last week was hurt again when he landed on it after completing a 16-yard screen pass to the 4. Zereoue finished that drive off on the next play that put the Steelers in front, 21-3, with 6:06 left in the third quarter.
There was no reason to believe that the Vikings could make such a comeback from that. The Steelers defense, ranked first in the league, had clamped down on Minnesota. The Vikings managed just 45 yards rushing and Culpepper had thrown for just 140 yards until he left in the fourth quarter.
But Bouman came in and completed 11 of 15 for 200 yards, most of them to Moss, who had 8 catches for 144 yards.
"It doesn't matter what the score is, especially the way we've been playing in the fourth quarter," Flowers said. "Teams can come back on us. Anytime you have an explosive offense like Minnesota, anything can happen. We barely escaped by the skin of our teeth."
Cozy 18-point lead nearly disappears in closing minutes 
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