Bengals loss plays like submission

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The Cincinnati Bengals have lost five consecutive games to the Steelers and eight of the past nine in the series. The loss Sunday afternoon at Heinz Field wasn’t as dramatic as previous ones, certainly not in the category of the thriller in the AFC wild-card round two seasons ago.

This one had the feel of submission.

Not that anyone inside the Bengals locker room would admit to such a thing after the 29-14 loss. But how else does one describe what Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton did late in the game when he threw the ball away on fourth down when his team still had a puncher’s chance at victory? Nomas! That’show it felt from afar. And who could blame Dalton? The Steelers sacked him four times and hit him on three other occasions. Three of those sacks came on the final seven plays the Bengals ran.

So, when Dalton saw Ryan Shazier speeding toward him with ill intentions on that fourth-down play, he threw it intothe third row rather than take another hit trying to make a play in a two-score game with 3½ minutes remaining.

Inside the Bengals locker room, the sting of defeat sparked some soul-searching.

“We just have to change the energy around here, the momentum,” Bengals cornerback Dre Kirkpatrick said. “I feel like we can do it. I’m going to embrace it. That’s one thing I ain’t never really done. I always fought it. ‘We could have done this. We could have done that.’ Embrace it. I feel like it’s time we start embracing it because that will tell us we’re acceptingwhat’s going on.

“Having so many things running through your mind, you don’t embrace the loss. I feel like sometimes we have to embrace the loss. It doesn’t matter who it is. We have to go back and fix it and move on. We got beat today. Let’s makeit up.”

The Bengals offense could manage just 179 yards against the Steelers and only 19 in the second half. Nineteen yards in 30 minutes of football.

So much for the new and improvedCincinnati offense.

The only Bengals victory in the past nine games came at Heinz Field in November 2015. That was the game the Steelers lost Le’Veon Bell for the season due to a knee injury after a Vontaze Burfict tackle.

The Bengals didn’t have an answer for Bell Sunday. He totaled 192 yards from scrimmage, doing damage in the running game (134 yards) and the passing game (58 yards). Forty-two of those receiving yards came on one play in which Bell stiff-armed Kirkpatrickto the turf as if he was a skier slaloming down a slope.

The Steelers treated the Bengals defense, which entered the day second in the NFL in defense, like a punching bag for long portions of the game. The only thing the Bengals did well was tighten up when the Steelers reached thered zone.

Unfortunately for them, theSteelers got inside their 20 six times.

“When you look at the game, what did you see?” Kirkpatrick asked. “Stop, stop, stop, big play. Stop, stop, stop, big play. If we eliminate the big plays it’s a different ballgame. We’re sitting here talking about a whole different game. Guys were out of position, mental errors. It was something. Everyone needs to hold themselves accountable.”

Bell had 109 yards from scrimmage by halftime. He touched the ball 38 times. Thirty-five of those came on runs with the Steelers lining up with fullback Roosevelt Nix and telegraphing what they were going to do. The Bengals still couldn’t stop him.

“Overall, we contained him, but he got a couple of big plays on us,” Bengals defensive end Carlos Dunlap said. “He’s a great football player. He’s going to make his plays. You’re not going to be able to fully stop a guy like that.”

The Bengals will get another shot at the Steelers in early December at Paul Brown Stadium in Cincinnati. If the Steelers are in their heads the Bengals aren’t admitting it.

“What do you mean, have our number?” Dunlap said. “They understand us. We play them twice a year, every year. I don’t think they have our number. I’m a grown man. I’m not ever going to give another man my number. They did what they had to do to win a football game today, and we didn’t. Sadly, that’s something that’s been a trend, but that doesn’t meanthat we can’t fix it.”

Added Kirkpatrick: “You hate to lose. That’s what gets in your head. It ain’t them. We’ll line it back up again and start the whole clock over again, same excitement, same joy to play the game andcompete.”