Despite finishing the season with a win, the game in Cleveland against the Browns turned out to be seemingly meaningless for the Steelers.
For the second time this season, the Steelers struggled to beat the Browns with a 13-9 victory to finish the season 12-4, while the Baltimore Ravens beat the Cincinnati Bengals to win the AFC North Division.
“I am proud of this team, I mean 12 wins. Twelve wins is great. Back to back 12 wins,” said DE Brett Keisel. “I’m very proud of this team the way they fought through adversity and found ways to win games.”
Despite continuing to suffer from a sprained ankle, Ben Roethlisberger played the entire game and ended up throwing for 221 yards.
“A lot better than San Francisco, but it still wasn’t great,” said Roethlisberger about his ankle. “It would have been nice for Cincy to step up and give us a week off, but we’ll get some hard work in to get it better.”
On the last play of the first quarter, RB Rashard Mendenhall severely injured his knee and looks to most likely miss the entire post-season.
“We had some injuries sustained in the game, many of which are minor, but the Rashard Mendenhall injury is not,” said head coach Mike Tomlin. “Potentially that’s a knee. We’ll get that taken a look at when we get back to Pittsburgh.”
With Mendenhall out of the game, Isaac Redman rushed for 92 yards and a touchdown but also fumbled the ball twice in crucial situations.
Hines Ward finished the game with five catches, giving him 1,000 career receptions, making him just the 8th player in NFL history to reach 1,000 career catches.
“A thousand catches, over 12,000 yards. Not bad for a guy considering where I came from and doing it with this great organization,” said Ward. “I think we all won. I think everybody was excited for it.”
“We tip our cap to Hines. Of course we’re excited and happy and proud of him,” said Tomlin. “What a tremendous accomplishment. We’re talking about a small few. But let’s face it, if we’re talking about Hines Ward and professional football, he’s in the category of a small few.”
With the win, the Steelers enter the playoffs as the 5th seed and will play the Broncos in Denver this coming Sunday at 4:30pm Eastern in the Wildcard game.
“It’s definitely exciting. This is where the fun begins,” said WR Antonio Brown. “Just go hard and this is January football. That’s kind of the mindset.”
“It will be interesting how we do this post-season,” said S Troy Polamalu. “The adversity that we face and how much we come together, we’re going to have to play some really good ball. We have a tough road ahead of us, especially going to Denver.”
Notes: The Steelers finished the season as the top ranked defense in the NFL in total yards allowed (271.8 yards per game) and passing yards allowed (172.2 yards per game)… The defense finished second in the NFL in points allowed with 14.5 points per game (second to San Francisco with 13.5 points per game)… With 1,000 career catches, Hines Ward joins seven other players in NFL history to reach that mark (Isaac Bruce – 1,024, Terrell Owens – 1,078, Tim Brown – 1,094, Cris Carter – 1,101, Marvin Harrison – 1,102, Tony Gonzalez – 1,149, Jerry Rice – 1,549)
Image Source – (Photo by Matt Sullivan/Getty Images)
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