Mention the Steelers' defense and you'll likely get a reply, "What defense?"
But in Sunday's 41-17 win over the Falcons, that might as well have changed to "What defense!"
The Steelers put together an old-school defensive effort against Atlanta's explosive offense, recording six sacks and limiting the Falcons to 324 yards, 111 of which came in the fourth quarter after the game had basically been decided.
A big part of that defensive effort was derived from the Steelers' ability to stop Atlanta's two-headed rushing attack of Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman. Those two were limited to 47 yards on 15 carries, an average of 3.1 yards per attempt.
It's been nothing new for the Steelers, now 2-2-1 this season. Though their defense has given up some passing yards, the run defense has been much improved over where it was at the end of last season after losing Ryan Shazier Dec. 4 at Cincinnati.
After being slammed out of the playoffs by Jacksonville and Leonard Fournette last season, the Steelers are allowing just 3.4 yards per carry to opposing running backs this season. This from a defense that allowed 134.2 yards and three individual 100-yard rushers in the five games after Shazier was injured last season.
Despite allowing 200-yard rushing games to Jacksonville and Chicago early in the season, the Steelers were allowing 88.5 yards on the ground before Shazier's injury.
"That's what we're trying to do," Stephon Tuitt told me. "I know it's tough to talk about with the kind of season we're having, but that's what we're going to continue to do week in and week out."
The key to stopping opposing backs has been the play of Cam Heyward and Tuitt. Though they're not necessarily posting big sack numbers this season -- though Heyward had 1.5 against the Falcons -- they're doing a good job of holding up linemen.
"It's kind of like old-school Steelers defense with Aaron Smith and those guys," Tuitt told me.
When Smith, Kimo von Oelhoffen, Casey Hampton and Brett Keisel were in their respective primes, the Steelers' defensive linemen's main job were to eat up blocks and allow the linebackers to flow to the ball and make plays. And they were nearly impossible to run the ball against.
In the past couple of years, the Steelers have asked their defensive linemen to penetrate more to help their pass rush. Now, they're blending that message, depending upon the opponent.
It's a reason why massive nose tackle Daniel McCullers is getting more playing time this season at the expense of penetrating nose tackle Javon Hargrave. McCullers got just 13 snaps all of last season, but played 12 snaps against the Falcons compared to 17 for Hargrave, the starter.
Against teams that are going to pass more, the Steelers might ask their linemen to penetrate. Against teams that want to run it more -- particularly in outside zone schemes -- the plan is to have the linemen hold up blockers and allow the linebackers to make plays.
"It's working," Heyward told me. "We're not happy with that. We've got to stop these quarterbacks, too. Quarterbacks breaking the pocket is part of the game. It means we're not doing a good job in our pass rush of keeping the quarterback in there. To control the line of scrimmage, you've got to be able to control these backs and get multiple guys to the ball."
To Heyward's point, the Steelers still rank just 15th in the league in rushing yards, allowing 105 yards per game overall. But they were hurt by Cleveland quarterback Tyrod Taylor running for 77 yards against them in a Week 1 tie.
Take Taylor's yards out of the equation, and the Steelers are allowing 89.5 yards rushing per game.
"We can be even more successful against the run," Heyward said. "We gave up a 20-yard run (against the Falcons). There are things we can improve there."
Even in today's pass-happy NFL, it's a formula that works. There are 12 quarterbacks completing more than two-thirds of their passes this season. But a run stop on first or second down can still add up to third-and-long situations if an incompletion is added to the mix. And despite their overall shoddy numbers against the pass, the Steelers are allowing opposing quarterbacks to complete just 62 percent of their passes. That ranks ninth in the league.
That's why even against a high-percentage passer such as Matt Ryan and Atlanta's high-powered passing attack, the Steelers' main focus was to slam the door on the running game.
"We wanted to stop the run early and make them have longer down and distances on third down, and allow the four-man rush to eat," said linebacker T.J. Watt, who had three of the Steelers' six sacks. "The back end did a great job of covering and making him hold the ball. I thought it was a great all-around performance. We were pretty pleased."
Watt now has six sacks. Bud Dupree has three. Jon Bostic has 2.5 and Anthony Chickillo and L.J. Fort have one each, giving the Steelers' linebackers 14.5 of the team's 19 sacks. The Steelers had a league-best 56 sacks last season and are on pace for 61 this season.
Now, they'll try to carry that performance over into their next game this Sunday against Cincinnati and running back Joe Mixon. Mixon has played in just three games this season because of a knee injury that sidelined him for two weeks. But he's averaging 90.7 yards on the ground per game, second only to Dallas' Ezekiel Elliott.
"He's a good running back. He does a lot of things," Tuitt said. "We're going to make sure we're ready for him and the things he's able to do."