You might not always be able to get what you want, but considering the Steelers have already gotten the bye week they needed, getting what they wanted -- a rematch with the Jacksonville Jaguars -- just seems like icing on the cake.
Jacksonville's 10-3 win over Buffalo Sunday locked the Jaguars into a second visit to Heinz Field for an AFC Divisional playoff game next Sunday at 1:05 p.m. It's a rematch the Steelers badly wanted.
Ben Roethlisberger said as much on his regular call in to 93.7 The Fan early last week and his teammates weren't backing away from that.
"I would love to see Jacksonville," Stephon Tuitt told me last week. "I think defensively, we also gave up 200 yards (rushing). We'd love to have another opportunity at them again in the playoffs. They had a great season and we want to see the best."
It wouldn't seem prudent that the Steelers would want to see a team that beat them 30-9 Oct. 8 at Heinz Field, Pittsburgh's most lopsided loss of a 13-3 season. But that game was perhaps the low point of the team's season. Roethlisberger was intercepted a career-high five times, two of which were returned for touchdowns. And Jacksonville running back Leonard Fournette rushed for 181 of Jacksonville's 231 yards on the ground.
The Steelers, however, led 9-7 midway through the third quarter when Roethlisberger threw his first interception that was returned for a score by linebacker Telvin Smith. And Fournette had 15 carries for 42 yards through three quarters and 91 yards on 27 carries -- a 3.4 average -- before breaking off a 90-yard run on his final carry in the closing two minutes.
"Not turn the ball over," said Steelers running back Le'Veon Bell when asked what the Steelers would need to do to win a rematch. "We gave them two touchdowns. They had a, what, 85-, 90-yard run at the end of the game in clean-up time? We played so terribly but we were still in that game. It’s not anything different that we’ve got to do other than protect the football, then we won’t have to feel the need to throw the ball 55 times.
"We’ll keep those guys balanced. They’ll have to play the run, have to play play-action. JuJu (Smith-Schuster) wasn’t even emerged then. JuJu didn’t really emerge until the Colts game. That’s when everyone was kind of like, ‘Oh, JuJu’s good.’ Now, they’ve got to game plan for all of that."
The Steelers wanted the bye week to skip having to play in a Wildcard game. They got that and it allowed them an opportunity to get healthier. Receiver Antonio Brown, who missed the final two games of the regular season with a calf injury, appears to be ready to return to practice this week after posting videos over the weekend of himself working out with former NFL receiver Chad Johnson in Miami:
L O A D I N G . . . pic.twitter.com/iKl0yIFbc2
— Antonio Brown (@AB84) January 7, 2018
With everyone healthy -- with the notable exception of inside linebacker Ryan Shazier -- the Steelers feel they're ready, regardless of what team they'll face in this postseason.
A game against the Jaguars will give the Steelers an opportunity to exact some revenge for one of their three losses this season. A win also would presumably give them a rematch against New England, which won, 27-24, in Pittsburgh last month in a game settled in the closing minutes. New England will host Tennessee next Saturday.
I asked Tuitt what gives this team the feeling it can win against two teams that defeated it in the regular season.
"Dale. I'm speaking as a player. No matter what team we face, they're going to give us their best shot," Tuitt told me. "Why not get the best right away? We're not scared of anybody. To get the chance to play a football game and play it the way you're supposed to play it. The outcome and some of the stats that come with that, that is what it is. But we are never afraid to play the best of the best. We're going to play better against the best of the best."
Regardless of who the opponent was going to be, the Steelers feel they're ready.
Now that’s over..LETS GO TO WORK❗️
— Mike Hilton (@MikeHilton_31) January 7, 2018