The Steelers needed something to hang their hat on defensively.
And if it takes a pair of goal-line stops against a team playing backups at quarterback and elsewhere, then they’ll still take it.
When the Colts were stonewalled twice in a row at the Steelers 1-yard line, it was the signature moment the Pittsburgh defense badly needed.
“It shows our attitude and demeanor and what we’re trying to do out there,” linebacker Lawrence Timmons said, via Joe Rutter of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “When you (won’t) take no for an answer and you really mean it, you see it out there. That’s the way our mentality has to be from here on out.”
The drives covered 62 and 89 yards, so it’s not as if Scott Tolzien wasn’t moving the Colts in the third and fourth quarters. But he threw incomplete on both fourth-and-goals at the 1, giving the Steelers hope for what is to come.
“Those are crucial stops,” Steelers safety Sean Davis said. “We won by three touchdowns, and if we don’t make those stops and they get points, the game is closer. The defense stepped up. We pride ourselves at that in practice each and every day — red zone — and we did a good job of stepping up today.”
They haven’t for much of the season, and in the larger context, doing it against the Colts Thursday might not mean all that much. But with the margins in the AFC North so thin already, they’re nothing but thankful for any good news they can get.