Familiar territory

The Steelers broke a tie with San Francisco for most conference championship appearances. The Steelers played in their 16th AFC championship. New England played in its 13th conference title game.

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — It was apparent from the outset of the AFC championship that the Steelers were going to need a big-time performance from their offense if they were going to advance to Super Bowl LI. New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady performed, as usual, surgery on the Steelers defense, which looked comically lost throughout the contest. The offense needed to come through to match the Patriots score for score, and they failed miserably.

The chances were there — plenty of them, as a matter of fact. But the execution in the red zone was underwhelming once again. One week after going 0 for 4 in the red zone in their divisional-round victory against Kansas City the Steelers were 1 for 3 in the red zone against the Patriots.

The biggest failure came late in the first half when the Steelers failed to score a touchdown after they had first-andgoal from inside the 1. DeAngelo Williams, who was playing for an injured Le’Veon Bell, lost 1 yard on first down and then lost 3 yards on second down. On third down, Ben Roethlisberger threw an