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Big Ben Roethlisberger pulled a Little Jack Horner last night. He put in his injured right thumb, pulled out a plum of a drive and showed again, "What a good quarterback am I!"

"The thumb feels pretty good," the Steelers' quarterback said after he threw a 16-yard touchdown pass to Cedrick Wilson on his sixth and final play of the night at Heinz Field. "It's all good."

It certainly was all good again for the third-year quarterback, who continues his remarkable comeback from a motorcycle accident two months ago, a return that hit a small speed bump when his right thumb was injured in practice Wednesday. He did not practice Thursday and was listed as questionable by coach Bill Cowher, but started his second consecutive exhibition game and looked good doing so.

Despite Roethlisberger's play, the Minnesota Vikings won, 17-10, in a game that was delayed 16 minutes because of a thunderstorm.

"It hurt having the rain and not having a chance to warm up," Roethlisberger said. "But coach [Mark] Whipple and I did some throwing inside of the tunnel, and it felt good enough that we came outside."

Roethlisberger directed the Steelers to a preseason touchdown for his first time in two years, taking them 55 yards on six plays on their first series. He threw a 16-yard touchdown pass to Wilson on third down to put the Steelers on top, 7-0.

"He operated the offense well," Wilson said of his quarterback. "We were able to score on the first drive, and that's always good. I thought we looked good as an offense."

That series began when Willie Parker handed off to receiver Nate Washington, who ran around left end for 20 yards to the Vikings' 35. The Steelers, in a bit of a surprise for an exhibition, ran a no-huddle offense.

"Pretty much the whole drive was a no-huddle drive," Roethlisberger said. "We give the offensive line a lot of credit; it's hard to hear out there sometimes, but they blocked up the guys, and the receivers got open."

Roethlisberger, as he did in one series the previous week, completed 3 of 4 passes; they covered 30 yards. He also took another hit on the incompletion, his second in two preseason games.

That was it for Roethlisberger, who has played two series in two games and completed 6 of 8 passes for 59 yards. He said he had no problems gripping the ball. He also said the Steelers might use the no-huddle offense more often this season. Under normal circumstances, Cowher would have played his starting quarterback more in the second preseason game. Cowher, though, said he's seen enough from Roethlisberger.

"With the training camp he's had and I've seen him in games, I think he's fine. He's playing with a lot of confidence right now. I want to give him enough to get a taste of it, and that's all we need to see."

Roethlisberger again stood up to a couple of hits yesterday with no apparent problem.

"I don't even know if that's a hurdle anymore," Cowher said. "I like what I saw with that first group with him in there. They took the ball down and scored."

Charlie Batch replaced Roethlisberger on the second offensive series, after the Vikings tied the game 7-7. If it weren't for a penalty on a late hit by cornerback Ike Taylor, the Vikings might not have scored. Safety Troy Polamalu tackled Travis Taylor for what should have been a nine-yard loss back to the 22. But Ike Taylor smacked into his namesake far behind the sideline for a 15-yard penalty and a first down at the 37.

Travis Taylor quickly turned this into a Taylor-made game when he re-ignited that drive with a 32-yard reception from Brad Johnson over Polamalu. Johnson completed the drive when he threw a one-hopper off the hand of linebacker James Farrior and into the mitts of tight end Jermaine Wiggins for a 12-yard touchdown.

The Vikings put together another scoring drive on their next series to take a 10-7 lead on Ryan Longwell's 38-yard field goal early in the second quarter. That gave Minnesota two scores on three series against the Steelers' first-team defense with the Vikings converting 3 of 5 first downs against them. Last week, the Steelers allowed 8 of 13 conversions on third down by the Arizona Cardinals.

"It's something that we're really going to have to take notice of and improve on before the season begins," Farrior said. "It's hurting us out there on the field."

Batch looked good in his second series, completing his first three passes for 47 yards. He appeared to be on target with a pass to rookie receiver Santonio Holmes, who did not look up as safety Darren Sharper intercepted it. Holmes came to the sideline, where coaches explained to him what he did wrong.

Batch completed 8 of 14 passes for 103 yards.

Minnesota added to its lead when rookie Tarvaris Jackson threw a 6-yard touchdown pass to fellow rookie Jason Carter on the Vikings' first series of the third quarter. The Steelers' own rookie quarterback, Omar Jacobs, guided his offense to a 32-yard Jeff Reed field goal that cut Minnesota's lead to 17-10 in the third quarter.

Jacobs threw two sweet passes on that drive. One, a 19-yard completion to rookie tight end Jon Dekker, came off a bootleg. On the other, he rolled away from pressure to his left on third down at the Vikings' 14 and threw a perfect pass between two defenders in the end zone along the left sideline -- and Lee Mays could not handle it.