Former Hokie steps into limelight
Aside from everyone’s pandemic worries, the 2020 NFL season can’t be going much better for Terrell Edmunds.
He’s a third-year starter at strong safety for the Pittsburgh Steelers, the league’s only unbeaten team.
As he did with Virginia Tech, he’s playing on the same team as his brother, Trey, a running back who is trying to solidify an NFL spot.
On Sunday, Edmunds stepped into the limelight with a pair of interceptions as the Steelers outclassed the Jacksonville Jaguars 27-3 in Florida. It had been 38 games since his only previous NFL pickoff, which came in his rookie season. The Danville native, who was chosen 28th in the 2018 draft’s first round, also made four tackles.
Even the Chuck Nollcoached teams that won four Super Bowls in a six-year span starting in January 1975 never started 10-0, but this year’s Steelers, guided by Peninsula native Mike Tomlin, have done so — though Tomlin said after the game, “The only thing perfect about this team is its record.”
Edmunds, 23, has 227 tackles in his 42-game career, along with six quarterback hits and a fumble recovery. He described his interceptions to Joe Rutter on triblive.com.
“Really, I’m just trying to help the team out the best way I can,” he said. “The first one was an overthrown ball. Tips and overthrows, as a DB, that’s what you’re asking for. The second one was just playing my zone. I made a nice drop.”
Edmunds’ first pick came
with 29 seconds left in the first half and the Steelers ahead 17-3. The second interception, with 8:43 left in the game, set up Ben Roethlis
berger’s 20-yard touchdown pass to Eric Ebron for the afternoon’s last score.
Some Pittsburgh fans want Edmunds to be more of a playmaker. But if nothing else, he’s reliable.
“I think his best ability is his availability when you really look at his career,” Tomlin said on triblive. com. “As a young guy, he has
gained a quality experience because of it. He has taken that experience and has continually made himself a better player, really in all areas and in pass recognition. I can’t say enough about his run-game fits in the way he is playing in that element of the game here in 2020. But largely, his game has always been on the upswing because
he is a young guy and is diligent and a young guy who is available.”
Next, the Steelers will take on their biggest rival, the slumping Baltimore Ravens (6-4), in a prime-time Thanksgiving showdown at Heinz Field.
“It is an honor for us to entertain our fans and fans in general on Thursday Night
Football and on Thanksgiving,” Tomlin said on steelers. com. “That’s not something that we take for granted. As a young guy who loved football, man, I grew up watching football on the holidays, and it’s an honor and it’s humbling to provide that for others and to be associated with that and the memories it creates.”