The Jaguars came into Sunday’s game against the Steelers having allowed 569 rushing yards over their last three games while the Steelers were coming off a game when they handed the ball to Le’Veon Bell 35 times, which seems like a combination that would make for an easy choice about how to attack the Jacksonville defense.
It wasn’t the choice that the Steelers made, however. Despite trailing 7-6 at halftime and grabbing a 9-7 lead in the third quarter, the Steelers went away from the run game on Sunday. Bell only ran the ball 15 times on Sunday, something that Jaguars safety Barry Church said “played right into our hands.”
So did five of the 55 passes that Ben Roethlisberger threw while the Jaguars turned that 9-7 deficit into a 30-9 win, including two that the Jaguars returned for touchdowns. Church had one of those picks and said after the game that Roethlisberger looked uncomfortable.
“Oh yeah, we could definitely tell,” Church said, via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “We were showing him multiple looks. He would go to first look, third look, man, and he would get flustered trying to make one of those miraculous Big Ben plays.”
Jaguars defensive tackle Malik Jackson said he thought Roethlisberger “looks good,” but that you could also “definitely tell he’s a little older and he was getting a little tired.” Sarcastic or not, Roethlisberger sounded a bit tired in his post-game comments and he’ll likely be seeing variations of what the Jaguars threw his way in the weeks to come as teams try to follow their path to beating the Steelers.