The Steelers delivered another heartbreaker to the Bengals in a newly disrespectful way

The Bengals led with 16 seconds to play. And then didn’t.

The Steelers needed a win Sunday in Cincinnati to shake off a 2-2-1 start and prove they’re still a Super Bowl contender. The Bengals needed a victory to stand alone top the AFC North and show their 4-1 start was no fluke. Add those stakes to the longtime rivalry between the two teams, and you’ve got the equation for some big and often brutal performances.

Bengals-Steelers has a well-earned reputation for physicality that borders on dirtiness. It’s the series that’s seen Vontaze Burfict destroy Antonio Brown and get destroyed by JuJu Smith-Schuster in the past two seasons. The last time they played, it was downright ugly. So Sunday set the stage for a rock fight, even if the players tried to downplay the significance of the rivalry between the two sides.

“It’s AFC North football,” Ben Roethlisberger said before the game. “It’s one of those game that can get chippy at times. You hope it doesn’t. You hope it’s just a hard-fought football game but sometimes it gets a little chippy. So, we’ll do our best to put all that in the past behind us and play like it’s a normal football game.

“It’s not about just the physicality of the football game to me,” he added. “It’s when it gets the extracurricular stuff that you wish would be cut out of it — and hope is cut out this time.”

But Week 6 was still about disrespect — just in a mostly different way

The Steelers turned up the intensity in what had been a back-and-forth game with a bruising drive late in the second quarter.

The disrespect started when Vance McDonald, best known in 2018 for stealing Tampa Bay defensive back Chris Conte’s soul, turned a 1-yard catch into a 26-yard gain. The veteran tight end smashed through noted Pittsburgh-hater Burfict, broke another tackle, and didn’t hit the turf until three Bengals could corral him at midfield.

Burfict would miss the rest of the drive while team trainers examined a shoulder injury.

The Steelers pushed into field goal range from there, but their clock-draining drive threatened to sputter out when Roethlisberger faced third-and-6 from the Cincinnati 30. A stop would have forced a long field goal on a windy, rainy afternoon — no sure thing for Chris Boswell, who had missed half his field goal attempts (3 of 6) and three extra points coming into Sunday.

Instead, JuJu Smith-Schuster made one of the finest catches of his career to keep the Pittsburgh drive alive.

Smith-Schuster rose up for an underthrown ball, caught it while reaching around Darqueze Dennard’s helmet, and held on while crashing to the ground. The second-year receiver skidded into the end zone on his head, but was ruled down by contact when his helmet hit the turf inside the Bengals’ 1-yard line.

One review later, James Conner dove over the pile to score his sixth rushing touchdown of the season and give the Steelers a 14-7 lead against the AFC North leaders.

And, like in the McDonald play, the Bengals lost a key player in the process. Dennard would leave the field with a shoulder injury that left his return questionable.

It didn’t last long. Cincinnati responded with a five-play, 44-yard drive that tied the game at 14-all with a 14-yard Tyler Boyd touchdown reception. And Burfict returned to the field in the third quarter and rammed his shoulder into Brown and his own teammate to cap off a crossing route that ended in a Steeler gain:

That play briefly led Brown to the sideline for a concussion evaluation; he was cleared to return to the field minutes later.

This all set up a furious final two minutes

The Steelers were able to drive into Bengals territory without much concern in the second half, but a questionable decision from head coach Mike Tomlin prevented them from scoring a game-sealing touchdown. Conner appeared to have broken into the goal line to cap off a 26-yard touchdown run in the third quarter, but was ruled down at the Cincinnati 1:

Tomlin could have challenged the ruling — like he did earlier on a third-down spot he was clearly going to lose — but instead opted to take the first-and-goal situation instead. Three plays and -2 yards later, Pittsburgh was forced to settle for a field goal.

That gave the Bengals the latitude for what appeared to be a game-winning two-minute drill. Andy Dalton led his team 75 yards to take a 21-20 lead that put the Steelers on the ropes with just 78 seconds left on the clock. But Roethlisberger still had three timeouts to work with and a Hall of Fame resume built on the burial grounds of Ohio’s professional football teams.

Roethlisberger converted a pair of important third downs, including one that came thanks to a defensive holding call, to push the Steelers into field goal range. And then, the dagger:

But, since this was Steelers-Bengals, even that couldn’t come without some controversy. Justin Hunter’s pick — or, more accurately, his straight-up blocking — was enough to spring Brown, giving the All-Pro wide receiver a wide-open berth to the end zone for the game-winning touchdown. Officials declined to throw an offensive pass interference flag, which would have pushed the team out of field goal range in the final seconds. Instead, Brown played the hero as the Steelers rose above .500 for the first time all season.

This is uncomfortably familiar for the Bengals

Sunday’s loss was nothing new for Cincinnati. Week 6 marked the Bengals’ seventh straight defeat against their division rivals, Five of their last six losses to the Steelers have come by a single possession.

This come-from-ahead loss, spurred by a controversial no-call, might not be as painful as last year’s Week 13 defeat, which saw the Steelers come back from a 20-10 fourth-quarter deficit and win on a last-second field goal.

It can’t touch the 2016 Wild Card loss where Burfict and Adam Jones gifted Pittsburgh the yardage it needed to kick a game-winning 35-yard kick (a play where referees failed to flag Steelers linebackers coach Joey Porter for traipsing onto the field to mix it up with Jones). In the great hall of Bengals-Steelers heartbreak, this game might not even make the top 10.

But this one could dictate how 2018 unfolds for each side. Pittsburgh needed an affirming win after an unsteady 2-2-1 start to its season that included an 0-1-1 record against AFC North competition. Cincinnati needed a victory to extend its claim atop the division and prove the dark days of 2016 and 2017 were in its past. In the end, only Mike Tomlin’s team got what it needed — and now Pittsburgh looks like a contender again, only half a game out of the North’s top spot.

No matter the outcome, however, it’s still evidence Steelers-Bengals is a must-watch rivalry. Especially if the two are battling for the AFC North title when they meet again in Week 17.