INGLEWOOD, Calif. -- Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert is in just his second NFL season and was making just his 25th career start here Sunday night at SoFi Stadium against the Steelers.
But he looked like a savvy veteran as he helped the Chargers build a 17-point fourth-quarter lead. And then, after the Steelers erased that lead and took one of their own, Herbert snatched victory from the jaws of defeat by taking advantage of some of the Steelers' inexperience.
Herbert threw a 53-yard touchdown pass to Mike Williams with 2:09 remaining in the game to lift the Chargers to a wild 41-37 victory over the Steelers, snapping Pittsburgh's streak of five consecutive games without a loss.
"It’s a big loss. You never like to lose football games," Ben Roethlisberger conceded. "You like to go on runs like we had had, but it’s a good football team. We came to their place and things happen. There’s still some time left. We’re just going to have to get it figured out and play our best football down the home stretch. That’s what it’s all about. It’s when can you play your best football. We have a few games left. We have a lot of division games coming.”
The game-winning touchdown pass came after the Steelers had stormed back from a 27-10 deficit entering the fourth quarter. The depleted defense stopped the Chargers on fourth-and-1 at the Los Angeles 34 as Joe Schobert knifed into the backfield to halt Austin Ekeler for no gain and turn the ball over on downs with 3:43 remaining.
It was one of the few times the Steelers (5-4-1) stopped Ekeler all night. He scored four touchdowns, two rushing and two receiving, and the Chargers rolled up 533 total yards against a Steelers defense missing linebacker T.J. Watt, safety Minkah Fitzpatrick and cornerback Joe Haden due to injury and COVID-19. It was the second-most yardage allowed by a Mike Tomlin-coached team, topped only by a game against the Patriots in 2013.
"That was a tough one," said Tomlin. "I’m just very appreciative of the efforts of our guys. All those expected and required, it still should be appreciated. I appreciate the way they stayed in and stayed together and fought. It was obvious we didn’t have a good enough plan tonight with our current makeup and state. We couldn’t get enough stops defensively. We couldn’t apply pressure with our four-man rush or keep them in the pocket. We weren’t good enough in coverage with less than seven. We have to get back to the drawing board and do a better job of putting them in positions to be successful with the people that we have at our disposal. That was challenging tonight but we make no excuses. It needs to be better."
Still, the Steelers seemed to be on the cusp of pulling off an historic upset. The franchise had been 0-230 when trailing by 17+ points in the fourth quarter of games, according to NBC Sports research.. They entered the night 6-point underdogs given the players they were missing and the fact Roethlisberger came off the COVID-19 List himself on Saturday and was forced to fly privately to Los Angeles to play in this game despite not practice all last week.
"What a crazy game. I think we had three series in the first half, three and three. No punts," said Roethlisberger. "We kept the punter on the sidelines, which is always good for offense. We blocked a punt, scored. The defense gets a turnover. Just a bizarre sequence of events. Obviously, we’d like to finish the game off. We’d like to stay on the field and score a touchdown."
After the turnover on downs, Roethlisberger, who finished with 273 yards passing and three touchdowns, threw incomplete to Chase Claypool on first down on a run-pass option.
"They had stacked the box, so we had to throw it," Roethlisberger explained on why the Steelers didn't run the ball in that situation.
On second down, he connected with James Washington on a crossing route that gained seven yards, but Washington was pushed out of bounds at the LA 27, again stopping the clock.
On third down, Roethlisberger had Diontae Johnson (seven receptions, 101 yards) in one-on-one coverage on the outside as he had been most of the game. But the quarterback was hit as he released the ball and Johnson was unable to come back to the under-thrown pass. Officials initially threw a penalty flag for pass interference on the play, but picked the flag up after a conference, saying it was uncatchable.
The Steelers settled for a 45-yard field goal and a 37-34 lead
"There was a pass interference or holding, and then they picked it up for uncatchable, which is referee’s discretion, I guess, and we settled for three," Roethlisberger said. "That’s disappointing because, offensively, we'd like to use the clock and finish that game off.”
The Chargers took over at their own 25 with 3:24 remaining, but wouldn't need much of that. Herbert, who threw for 382 yards and three touchdowns with one interception, completed a short pass to tight end Donald Parham. Then, he found Ekeler for a 17-yard catch-and-run to the LA 47.
Finally, on first-and-10, the Steelers called for a blitz out of the slot by Arthur Maulet. That meant Cam Sutton slid to the inside receiver, and rookie Tre Norwood, starting at free safety in place of Fitzpatrick, was supposed to rotate to the outside receiver.
That didn't happen. Instead, this did.
Norwood's inexperience showed. NFL NextGen Stats, which uses player-tracking data, estimates Williams had an outrageous 10.2 yards of separation from Norwood by the time he caught the ball en route to a 53-yard touchdown.
"We just didn’t execute the call," Sutton said. "At a critical point in the game, we’ve got to be all on the same page and can’t have any miscommunications. We just didn’t get it done."
Roethlisberger was sacked on back-to-back plays when the Steelers got the ball back and then was unable to complete passes in long-yardage situations, leading to a turnover on downs and the end of the game.
It was a disappointing end to a game in which the Steelers got back into it with a big play on special teams after forcing the first punt by the Chargers in the game with 12:40 remaining. To that point, the Chargers had five possessions and had scored on all five to take a 27-13 lead.
But after offsetting penalties were called on Chargers punter Ty Long's first kick, he was forced to do it again. This time, Miles Killebrew came straight through the middle of the line for a clean block, his second of the season.
The ball scooted out of bounds at the Los Angeles 3, and the Steelers eventually punched it into the end zone on a 1-yard Najee Harris plunge to make it 27-20.
The Chargers answered with another scoring drive, with the killer play coming on a 36-yard Herbert scramble on third-and-5 from the Pittsburgh 47. Ekeler scored from the 5 to push the Chargers' advantage back to 14 points at 34-20.
But Roethlisberger completed 7 of 8 passes on the ensuing possession, tossing a 5-yard touchdown to Eric Ebron to put the Steelers back within one score at 34-27.
Cam Heyward then tipped a pass at the line of scrimmage on the Chargers' next possession and Sutton made a diving interception at the Los Angeles 11 to set up a 5-yard touchdown pass to Pat Freiermuth.
"They went empty. Main thing for us: we knew the ball was coming up quick," Heyward said. "Get your hands up. (I) think (Isaiah) Buggs had gotten a couple tips early on. Just tried to get my hand in the passing lane and then Cam Sutton made a heck of a play. Caught it and gave the offense short field."
That tied the game and set the stage for Schobert's stop on fourth down.
• The Chargers and at least some of the fans -- it was a largely Steelers crowd -- were upset when video showed Heyward hitting Herbert in the stomach after chasing him down at the end of his 36-yard run.
Heyward was penalized for unnecessary roughness on the play.
"I think that the truth will express itself from the video," Chargers head coach Brandon Staley said.
But Heyward had a simple explanation, his hand was initially trapped under Herbert and he lost his balance getting up.
"I was trying to get up and I couldn't get up and fell back on him," Heyward said. "It was terrible. There was nothing malicious behind it. I wasn't trying to punch him. I know it looks worse in slow motion. I'm sorry if I did anything to upset anybody. I wish I had said more to Justin after, but there was nothing behind it."
Heyward also told me that he was being pulled up by one of the Chargers players, whose grasp on him slipped, causing him to fall back on Herbert. He didn't realize a penalty flag had been thrown on the play until moments later.
• Herbert's scrambling hurt the Steelers throughout this game. He rushed for a career-high 90 yards on nine carries -- though he had 93 yards on six rushes before three kneel downs at the end of the game.
Four of his runs converted third-down situations, as the Steelers lost contain again and again. That's where Watt might have come in handy.
As you see on this play, Delonte Scott, activated off the practice squad Saturday, gets pressure on Herbert, but gives up outside contain, and the quarterback simply beats the defense to the outside for an easy 18 yards.
"We just weren’t effective at keeping him in the pocket," Tomlin said. "We talked Tuesday about his mobility and what a factor it was. It wasn’t a surprise to us. We just didn’t perform well enough against it.”
Herbert entered the game with 117 rushing yards. The Steelers made him look like Lamar Jackson.
The difference is that the Steelers were playing a man defense most of the time when Herbert was making those plays with his legs. They rarely play man against the Ravens for just that reason. The defensive backs often have their backs to the ball when they're in man defense.
• This goes down as a loss to be sure, but it also showed the resilience of this team. Down 17 points in the fourth quarter, there was no quit.
That should bode well for them moving forward. At 5-4-1, they now are behind the Ravens (7-3) and Bengals (6-4) in the AFC North standings. As luck would have it, their next two opponents are the Bengals in Cincinnati and Ravens at home.
So, while this loss hurts, win the next two games and things kind of take care of themselves.
After all, while the Steelers are playing the Bengals, the Ravens will play the Browns. Cleveland then has a bye the week the Steelers host the Ravens. And then they play the Ravens again. It's a heck of a scheduling quirk, but the Browns essentially have two-straight games against the Ravens.
• Matt Canada's play calling can be good and creative at times. But it sure seems like when he gets down inside the 10 -- and certainly inside the 5 -- things get pretty predictable.
In fact, on the Steelers' second drive, when they faced fourth-and-goal from the 2, as Harris motioned out of the backfield, Freiermuth motioned from outside the formation to the wing. I called out inside flip to Freiermuth in the press box, which was exactly what the Steelers ran as the Chargers sniffed it out and stopped the tight end for no gain.
After the blocked punt in the fourth quarter, following an incompletion to Harris on first-and-goal from the 3, the Steelers tried for a second time in the game to run Claypool on a jet sweep. The Chargers stopped him for a 2-yard loss and Roethlisberger gestured with his hands upraised toward the sideline.
"It’s just frustrating when you can’t score. As an offense and as the quarterback, the leader of the offense, when you can’t score, you have to take it on yourself," he said when I asked him about it. "There’s no one specific reason, other than we didn’t put seven points on the board. That’s frustrating as a quarterback.”
• The Chargers were dedicated to not allowing Harris to get going in this game. Yes, they came in allowing 155.1 yards rushing per game. But when Harris was in the backfield, it was clear they were keying on stopping him, just as they had done the week before with the Vikings' Dalvin Cook, who had to grind out 94 yards on 26 carries.
Harris didn't get anywhere near that, gaining 39 yards on 12 carries.
Why only 12 carries?
Well, the Steelers ran the ball 18 times total in this one and Roethlisberger dropped back to pass 47 times. But that was largely due to game script. The Steelers entered the second half down 17-10 and the Steelers had 14 carries for 53 yards.
But because they got down two scores after the Chargers marched down the field on the opening possession of the second half, the Steelers only ran the ball four times in the final two quarters.
• Alex Highsmith could benefit in the long run from this game.
With Watt out, Highsmith became the guy the Steelers moved around the formation. He ended up rushing from both sides and finished with 1.5 sacks, sharing one with Taco Charlton. Highsmith also had three quarterback hits.
That gives him three sacks and 10 quarterback hits in his past fives games after being slowed early by a groin injury.
Remember, both Watt and Highsmith were out in the Steelers' Week 3 loss to the Bengals. I would expect Watt to be back this week -- he was actually close to being cleared for this game but the Steelers erred on the side of caution rather than sending him out there at far less than 100 percent.
Those two coming off the edge with Heyward playing as well as he currently is, could make a huge difference against the Bengals.
So would the return of Fitzpatrick, who should be cleared to come off the COVID-19 list by then.
• Speaking of the COVID-19 List, players not only have to test negative twice in a 24-hour period. They must also then get league approval to return.
That's why Roethlisberger wound up having to take his own flight to Los Angeles.
He passed his final test one minute after midnight on Saturday morning, but had to wait for the league to approve it.
"You literally just take a test every day and hope it’s negative," said Roethlisberger, adding that he did feel ill the previous Saturday when he went on the list but was fine after that moving forward.
"That’s kind of what it is. It’s a very interesting process.”
• With Watt out, Heyward got all kinds of attention from the Chargers. He was essentially double teamed on every play of note. Yet his hustle on the 36-yard run by Herbert -- after playing about 60 defensive snaps to that point -- was noteworthy.
As good as Watt is, Heyward is the straw that stirs the drink. He's also the team's biggest critic -- every week.
"I think (Herbert) identified what we were in early on and then, as soon as he saw when he was spreading out, he took advantage," Heyward said. "We’ve got to clean that up. Obviously, it wasn't what we need to be in. We gave up a bunch of yards and we paid the price."
• We're now 10 games into this season and Devin Bush still isn't doing much -- if anything -- in terms of making impact plays.
A big reason for that is the defensive-line play in front of him. Outside of Heyward, the Steelers continue to get less-than-consistent strong play from their linemen. Offensive linemen are getting to the second level way too easily. And Bush and Schobert continue to pay the price.
That said, you are permitted to get off a block. And it's OK to make a play in coverage every once in a while.
That's not happening much.
GETTY
JuJu Smith-Schuster signs autographs prior to the Steelers taking on the Chargers in Inglewood, Calif.
THE ESSENTIALS
• Boxscore
• Live file
• Scoreboard
• Schedule
• Standings
• Statistics
THE INJURIES
• T.J. Watt, linebacker, was inactive with a hip/knee injury
• Joe Haden, cornerback, was inactive with a foot injury
• Kevin Dotson, guard, was inactive with an ankle injury and added to IR
• Minkah Fitzpatrick, safety, was placed on the Reserve/COVID list this week
• J.C. Hassenauer, guard, suffered a pectoral injury and did not return
• Eric Ebron, tight end, suffered a knee injury and did not return
THE AFC NORTH
• Baltimore
• Cincinnati
• Cleveland
THE SCHEDULE
Next game: Cincinnati.
DALI KOVACEVIC / DKPS
THE MULTIMEDIA
Our game-related video, podcast:
THE CONTENT
Visit our team page for everything.
