After scoring a pair of touchdowns in the final 8 minutes of the fourth quarter, aided by a pair of forced fumbles by defensive end Myles Garrett, the Browns and Steelers played to a 21-21 tie.
Steelers kicker Chris Boswell had an opportunity to win it in overtime but missed a 42-yard field goal try wide left into the Dawg Pound with 1:47 remaining and Cleveland’s Zane Gonzalez was no good from 42 yards with 9 seconds left after Steelers linebacker T.J. Watt got a push and his hands on the football off Gonzalez’s foot sealing the draw.
“I felt like I hit a great ball, but when I looked up, it was a boom-boom situation,” Gonzalez said. “It kind of sucked.”
That's an understatement.
“The miss at the end I think had nothing to do with the conditions,” head coach Hue Jackson said. “I would like to see the play because I thought someone was offside. The ball got blocked. The ball did not get up. The trajectory of the ball was kind of low. They were able to make a play. They made the play when they had to for this game to end in a tie.”
Browns rookie defensive end Genard Avery set up the last second kick when he strip-sacked Ben Roethlisberger and linebacker Joe Schobert picked it out of the air before returning it 27 yards to the 14, but a block in the back penalty on the return by Garrett moved the ball back to the Pittsburgh 29 with :36 left in overtime.
Cleveland’s defense forced 6 turnovers in the tie – 3 fumbles and 3 interceptions – but the offense did very little with them, especially in the first half. They had 13 takeaways all of last year combined.
Longing to put the ugly past behind them with 31 new players, the Browns played like the same sloppy undisciplined team they’ve been for years through most of the first 3 quarters before pulling it together late.
Quarterback Tyrod Taylor was sacked 7 times, the offense was flagged a multitude of times for false starts and illegal formations and there were missed blocking assignments galore to sum up the frustration from the first 52 minutes of play.
“It is something that we can’t do moving forward,” Taylor said. “We talk about minus plays, and pre-snap penalties are something that we can’t do if we want to be the team that we want to be.”
Taylor was an unimpressive 15 of 40 for 197 yards with a touchdown and interception in his Cleveland debut. He ran 8 times for 77 yards and a score.
“We definitely fought hard throughout four quarters and even in overtime,” Taylor said. “A tie is just a sour taste. Whatever we have to do to get this team a win and multiple wins after that, we have to find what that is. As far as the offense goes, that starts with me.”
Pittsburgh showed Le’Veon Bell they can do without him as his replacement – James Conner – gashed Cleveland’s defense for 135 yards on 31 carries and a pair of touchdowns.
Conner also caught 5 passes for 57 yards but a fourth quarter fumble with 7:49 remaining in the fourth caused by Garrett opened the door for the Browns. Safety Jabrill Peppers returned the ball 16 yards to the 1 setting up Carlos Hyde’s 1-yard run to make it a 1-score game at 21-14 with 7:32 left in regulation.
On the ensuing possession Garrett strip-sacked Roethlisberger and linebacker Joe Schobert fell on the loose ball at the Pittsburgh 37. Unfortunately, the offense did nothing with it and Britton Colquitt’s ninth punt of the day commenced. Colquitt downed it at the 5.
“It was a thriller. It was fun,” Garrett said. “The whole game going back and forth, I know they had the momentum going into basically the second half and much of the third quarter. We fought back and tied it up. That is just a credit to the perseverance and the toughness on this team to not give up.”
Rookie cornerback Denzel Ward thwarted the Steelers’ third drive of the day with 5:32 left in the opening quarter when he jumped a route in front of Steelers receiver Antonio Brown to lay out and haul in the pass at the 9. It was the first red zone takeaway since 2016 for Cleveland.
Ward picked Roethlisberger again with 51 seconds left in the half on second-and-10 after a ball went off the hands of tight end Jesse James and into the arms of the former Buckeye, who returned it 25 yards to mid-field.
Garrett got that long-awaited sack of Roethlisberger on the first play of the second quarter, dropping him for a loss of 5. On the same drive Garrett was flagged for unnecessary roughness on third down that saw Roethlisberger throw the ball away out of the back of the end zone.
On the next play Conner ran it in from 4 yards out for a 7-0 lead.
“We talk about the rules probably more than any team in the league,” Jackson said. “We show tape. We do all of that, but obviously, we are not understanding to the degree that we need to in order for it not to hurt us, and that is disappointing.”
Damarious Randall, who ran a better route than Brown, played center field and intercepted a deep ball from Roethlisberger at their own 28 with 7:30 left in the second.
The Browns were out-gained 196-98 in the first 30 minutes and they had as many penalties and first downs – 7.
Two penalties on Steelers corner Artie Burns, who got into it with Browns receiver Jarvis Landry, gave the Browns life, and they followed with seven runs in a row capped by Taylor’s 20-yard touchdown with 10:05 left in the third. Taylor ran to his left up the far sideline and lowered his shoulder at the goal line to get into the end zone to tie the game at 7.
On their ensuing possession the Steelers scored on 3 consecutive plays but only 1 counted. Conner’s 2-yard TD run was wiped out by a holding penalty, a 12-yard strike to receiver Justin Hunter in the back of the end zone was taken off the board because of an illegal hands to the face penalty before Roethlisberger connected with Brown on the far side despite tight coverage from Ward for a 14-7 lead with 8:24 remaining in the third.
The Browns ended a streak of losing 13 straight openers and are 1-19-1 in them since 1999. They also avoided a new franchise record with an 18th consecutive regular season defeat, while also avoiding tying the third longest losing streak in NFL history.
Roethlisberger is now 21-2-1 as a starter against Cleveland and the Steelers 33-6-1, including playoffs, since 1999.