Steelers Stay Perfect

Deshaun Watson had too much time and too many open receivers for the Pittsburgh Steelers’ liking Sunday afternoon at Heinz Field.

They did something about it after halftime.

The Steelers bottled up Watson in the second half and used a long touchdown drive in the fourth quarter to pull out a 28-21 victory against the Houston Texans to improve to 3-0 for the third time in coach Mike Tomlin’s 14 seasons and first time since 2010.

“It’s huge for us, especially here at home,” said quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, who threw two first-half touchdown passes while playing in his franchise-record 221st game. “I said in the postgame that there are no fans here, but we still want to win at home and we want to win for our fans that are watching around the world.”

To get to the elusive 4-0 mark for the first time in the Tomlin era, the Steelers will have to beat the 3-0 Tennessee Titans, and they will have to do it on the road next Sunday.

For a while, it looked like the Steelers might not remain perfect. Watson had 202 yards passing and two touchdowns in the first half to help the Texans (0-3) build 14-3 and 21-17 leads.

A Pro Bowl quarterback the past two seasons, Watson routinely exploited the middle of the field against the Steelers defense.

Everything changed once the teams returned from intermission. Stephon Tuitt and T.J. Watt had sacks of Watson to shorten two drives, and Mike Hilton had an interception in the red zone that set up the go-ahead drive in the fourth quarter.

Watson had just 62 yards passing in the second half, and the Texans had just two first downs and 51 net yards after halftime. Watson was sacked five times.

“We just mixed some things up with our coverages, and we rushed a little bit differently,” Tomlin said. “He was finding escape lanes, not necessarily in an effort to run, but in an effort to buy time and break down some of our zone coverages and find open spaces. We made minor technical adjustments to rush and coverage, and that was the difference.”

Hilton’s interception return to the Steelers 21 set up a 12-play, 79-yard touchdown drive that lasted 7 minutes, 3 seconds. Conner’s 12-yard touchdown run with 6:24 left and Roethlisberger’s 2-point conversion pass to JuJu Smith-Schuster gave the Steelers a 28-21 lead.

Conner rushed for 109 yards on 18 carries.

“We’re a four-quarter team,” Conner said. “Our defense allowed us to get back in it. When the defense is making three-and-out stops, keep putting us back on offense, we’ve got to get it going eventually.”

Roethlisberger threw first-half touchdown passes to Eric Ebron and Smith-Schuster while completing 23 of 36 attempts overall for 237 yards and no interceptions.

On the first drive of the second half, the Steelers converted a pair of first downs — one via a pass interference penalty — but had to settle for Chris Boswell’s 26-yard field goal that cut their deficit to 21-20.

The first two Texans series ended in three-and-outs. On the third drive, Watson got the Texans inside Steelers territory, but he was forced from the pocket on third-and-15 and was intercepted in the red zone by Hilton, who returned the ball 8 yards to the Steelers 21 with 13:27 left.

“I think more than anything we want to be able to be the spark,” said Watt, who had two tackles for loss and four quarterback hits. “We knew coming out of halftime the energy was very down. We thought as a defense we should be the ones to pick the pace up and lead it off.”

On the ensuing touchdown drive, Conner carried four times for 35 yards and caught an 8-yard pass. Roethlisberger converted three third downs, two of which consisted of 14-yard passes to tight ends Ebron and Vance McDonald, respectively.

“Huge,” Roethlisberger said of the drive. “We need to give our defense a break. We talked about the first half that we didn’t do that well enough. They got the ball for us. It was kind of one of those situations where it was gut-check time.”

Watt’s 11-yard sack of Watson on the next series led to another three-and-out. The Steelers got the ball back with 4:47 left and never gave Watson another chance.

The Steelers converted a fourth-and-1 at the Texans 25 with a 7-yard reception by James Washington. A 24-yard pass to Chase Claypool before the 2-minute warning put the ball on the Texans 3. With the Texans out of timeouts, Roethlisberger kneeled three times to end it. “We have all the faith in the world in our defense if we put them out there that they’ll do what they have to do,” Roethlisberger said. “But if we don’t have to put them out there, we’ll try not to.”