ARLINGTON, Texas -- Mike Tomlin often says he doesn't like to live in his fears.
That essentially means he's not going to concern himself with what a potential bad outcome might be on a play.
But Tomlin most definitely was living in his fears in Sunday's 24-19 win over the Cowboys here at AT&T Stadium.
Clinging to that lead with less than a minute remaining, the Steelers turned Dallas over on downs at the Cowboys' 24.
They then ran the ball three-straight times to force the Cowboys to use their remaining timeouts. But they faced fourth-and-1 at the Dallas 15 with 43 seconds remaining. A field goal would give the Steelers an 8-point lead with 30 or so seconds remaining and the Cowboys using a fourth-string quarterback.
Not only would the Cowboys have to navigate the length of the field and score a touchdown, they also would need a two-point conversion to tie the game.
Tomlin instead kept his offense on the field, and James Conner, who had barely played in the second half as the Steelers went to a formation that didn't utilize a running back, was dropped for a 4-yard loss on fourth down, giving the ball back to the Cowboys.
"We had struggled so much with our field goal group earlier in the game that I just didn’t feel good about it," Tomlin explained of his decision. "They were beating us to the punch for the better part of the day on special teams. We missed the extra point. They blocked (an extra point). We skied a kick trying to pin them down and they flipped the field with a big return. I had just seen enough of their dominance in teams."
It was a rare admission of living in his fears from Tomlin, who at the end of the first half had placekicker Chris Boswell attempt a 59-yard field goal after a five-yard penalty for a false start on Cam Heyward had pushed the attempt back. Boswell had missed the initial attempt. He nailed the second try, setting a team record with that kick.
But it was the blocked extra point -- one of two misses by Boswell in this game -- that scared Tomlin the most.
Defensive end Tyrone Crawford had hurdled long-snapper Kameron Canaday to block the kick earlier in the fourth quarter.
"That block was easy. That guy was standing in the backfield on two feet," Tomlin admitted. "That was a problem for us. We’ll get back in the lab and go through a week of correction and fundamentals and making sure we’re solid there as opposed to trying to fix something in-game and run the risk of a double thud again. I am not about that life."
He might not be about "that life," but it was nearly a critical error as the Cowboys finished the game throwing the ball into the end zone for a potential game-winning touchdown.
• Yes, special teams were an issue for the Steelers throughout this game. And part of the reason for that might be that so many of their core special teams players are now playing a lot of offense and defense.
Robert Spillane is now a starter at inside linebacker. Cornerback Cam Sutton has seen a big increase in playing time as the nickel cornerback with Mike Hilton missing his third-straight game with a shoulder injury. Wide receiver Chase Claypool has seen his offensive snaps increase seemingly each week.
The list goes on and on. And fullback Derek Watt, signed because of his very good play on special teams, was inactive for this game as the Steelers tried to give him a week off to get his sore hamstring completely healed.
That's not making any excuses for anyone. If the player is on the field, he's capable of making the plays necessary to help the team win the game.
But the Steelers' special teams units had been so good this season -- they entered the week ranked seventh in the league in overall special teams play according to FootballOutsiders.com -- that it was alarming that they were so bad in this game.
The lone exception was punter Jordan Berry, who averaged 50.8 yards per kick.
• It's not all that crazy to think the Steelers would struggle in this game. The Ravens struggled in their game, as well, on Sunday, failing to score an offensive touchdown in the first half of their 24-10 win over the Colts.
As I laid out in the Point Park University Friday Insider last week, the Steelers and Ravens both typically struggle the week after playing each other. And this also was the Steelers' third consecutive road game. NFL teams typically only win that third-straight road game about 33 percent of the time.
Give the Cowboys credit. They played hard, as they had two weeks ago in their 23-9 loss to the Eagles. They played a lot like the 2019 Steelers, pulling out all the stops in an attempt to win this game.
It nearly worked. But the Steelers looked like a tired team, and that didn't help.
• JuJu Smith-Schuster continues to be Ben Roethlisberger's go-to guy when this team needs a spark. Roethlisberger went to him four times on a 75-yard touchdown drive, with Smith-Schuster accounting for every yard on the possession, including a 31-yard touchdown.
"He’s a playmaker. He’s a guy I trust," Roethlisberger said. "He’s a guy that I know is going to make plays when you put it in his area. He showed that again that he’s a guy who just battles. He’s competitive. He’s a warrior."
The other receivers on the team are good, as well. But Claypool had the dropsies in this game, and Diontae Johnson does get nicked up from time to time, even though he's special with the ball in his hands.
Smith-Schuster is kind of the heart and soul of this offense.
• That empty backfield package with four receivers -- Smith-Schuster, Claypool, Johnson and Ray-Ray McCloud -- with one tight end -- usually Eric Ebron -- is proving to be a matchup nightmare for opposing teams.
For the second consecutive week, it was the reason why the Steelers won.
"We got them in a personnel group that reduced the things they could do," Tomlin said of that package. "When we can have that kind of clarity, we’re comfortable playing in any mode. That’s why we went to the structure we went to."
I wouldn't mind seeing the Steelers utilize running back James Conner with that package, as well, perhaps subbing him for McCloud. At least then, the Steelers would have the potential to run out of that package with something other than an end around.
But the Steelers need to utilize it more often early in games instead of waiting to put it out there when they're trying to come back.
"Yeah, I think that’s something we can do early in the game and see what they come out in," Smith-Schuster said. "That’s something we can use to our advantage instead of pulling it out in the second half and letting Ben do what Ben does."
• There's nothing wrong with the Steelers' run defense that the offense putting up some points early in a game wouldn't help solve.
Perhaps it won't be the shutdown unit it had been earlier in the season. After all, inside linebacker Devin Bush isn't getting back onto the field this season.
But the defense has been forced to play too much the past two weeks. The Ravens ran nearly 80 plays last Sunday. The Cowboys ran 71 plays in this game. And because the Steelers' offense wasn't doing much in the first half, the Cowboys could stick with their running game, much the same way the Ravens did the week before.
This is not to excuse giving up some big runs at bad times, but the Steelers did hold Ezekiel Elliott to 51 yards on 18 carries, an average of 2.8 yards per carry.
The problem was that the Cowboys could keep running because they were leading.
"Really, for us, it was about keeping our defense off the field. We couldn’t get a drive going in the first half and our defense was tired," Ebron said. "We didn’t give them any chance to regroup or recalibrate. We just kept putting them back on the field. That’s not a good look for us and that’s not a good look for them."
• Give Garrett Gilbert some credit. He presented some issues for the Steelers, though part of the reason for that is because the Steelers had no real game tape of him from which to know how to attack him.
So they laid back.
"We didn’t have a lot of film on him and that can be kind of deceiving," Heyward said. "If you take chances, you don’t know if he’s more mobile than you think. I thought in the second half, we were able to get into some more situations where we could bring more pressure. Early on, we didn’t stop the run that well and they were falling forward."
Gilbert did some good good things in this game. The Cowboys will beat some teams with him at quarterback the rest of the season -- if they choose to go that route. He's more mobile than Andy Dalton, who was out with a concussion and COVID.
• The Steelers are now 5-0 in one-score games this season. They were 6-5 in such games last season, but have been one of the better teams in such games over the past decade.
Some teams just know how to win those kind of games.
A big reason for that is Roethlisberger. But it also rubs off on the players around him. They don't panic in those kind of situations.
"I joke, I say ‘I feel like I’m too old for this stuff.’" Roethlisberger said of the close games this season. "Sometimes my body gets worn down by the emotional rollercoaster that are these last few weeks. But we keep winning and I’m having fun with these guys. I want to play and win for them."
• The Cowboys weren't happy with a couple of the penalties that were called against them in the fourth quarter of this game, but really the only one that was questionable was Leighton Vander Esch being called for unnecessary roughness after taking a swing at Anthony McFarland on a fourth-quarter run.
McFarland most certainly could have been called for something, as well, making an offsetting penalty.
But that came at the end of a 6-yard run on first down, and though the Steelers benefitted from the 15-yard penalty, there's a good chance they still would have gotten the field goal they did on that drive if the penalty hadn't been called.
Jaylon Smith's illegal contact penalty that negated a Roethlisberger fumble the Cowboys recovered was absolutely the right call, as was a roughing the passer call on Smith that kept the Steelers' go-ahead touchdown drive alive. Smith clearly contacted Roethlisberger in the face with his hand.
"I was trying to rush the quarterback, press the pocket and put my hands up when the ball was coming out," said Smith. "That's what it was. Questionable call."
No, you can't hit the quarterback in the head. Period.
Dallas head coach Mike McCarthy wasn't using any of that as an excuse.
"You can write on it as much as you want," said McCarthy. "Go for it. We need to focus on the things we can do better. What was called, what wasn't called, we don't have control of that."
• So the Steelers are now 8-0 for the first time in team history. There's no reason to apologize for that.
They'll likely lose at some point. But remember, as well, that Tomlin's teams typically get better as the season wears on. Over the previous five seasons, the Steelers are 24-9 in December and January. And three of those losses came last season when the Steelers lost their final three games once the offense finally crapped out at the end of the year without Roethlisberger.
As we saw with the Seahawks losing at Buffalo, the Bucs getting spanked by the Saints -- again -- and the Chiefs nearly losing at home again, this time to the Panthers, anything can happen in NFL games.
But if you can keep winning, you set yourself up well for the second half. And that's what the Steelers have done.
Wins are wins in this league.