Young back looks for comfort zone
James Conner’s two breakout runs in the final five minutes against Tampa Bay were big because they enabled the Steelers to run out the clock and preserve their first victory of the season.
But they were big for another reason, too.
Not only did they come in a game when Conner was having difficulty finding any running room, losing yardage on five carries and gaining nothing on two others against the Buccaneers.
Maybe more important, they were the longest and most productive runs Conner has had since his fumble in the fourth quarter in Cleveland that turned around the season opener.
“It was nice to close it out,” Conner said.
That didn’t happen three weeks ago in Cleveland, when Conner’s fumble with 7:36 remaining led to a Browns touchdown that began a 14-point comeback in a 21-21 tie.
But Monday night, with 5:43 remaining from the Steelers 25, Conner went off the left side for a 27-yard gain, his longest run of the season. When the Steelers got the ball back after a three-and-out stop, he broke off a 17-yard run to the Tampa Bay 33 right before the two-minute warning, allowing Ben Roethlisberger to take a knee on three consecutive plays and run out the clock.
“That was huge to close out the game like that and finish with strong runs,” center Maurkice Pouncey said. “To have four-minute football like that, be able to go out and run the football and go out and take a couple knees to win the game, as offensive linemen we’re very proud of it.”
Four-minute football is to the offense what the “prevent” is to defense. It’s how offenses go into prevent mode — trying to gain yards on the ground so as not to pass to protect a lead. It runs the clock, forces the other team to use timeouts and, maybe most important, avoids stoppages with an incomplete pass. Or, worse, an interception.
“They were big for our team and obviously big for him,” offensive coordinator Randy Fichtner said. “There’s no doubt we needed that. That’s what you’re attempting to do in four-minute offense, and that’s what we did.”
Conner finished with 61 yards on 15 carries, thanks to those two runs, and leads the AFC with 213 rushing yards heading into a divisional meeting Sunday with the Baltimore Ravens.
But from the time of his fumble on a 2yard loss against the Browns to the 27yard run on first down against Tampa Bay, it had been a struggle. Conner had carried 34 times for just 40 yards, a 1.2yard average. Eight of his runs were for negative yards.
“You can see he was getting a little frustrated,” said guard David DeCastro, who is expected to return against the Ravens after missing the previous two games with a fractured hand. “I talked to him and told him, some teams are going to pass the ball. You can’t force the ball in this league.
“I saw him afterward, I was laughing, he was all pumped up and I said, I told you, man, it’s going to come. You got to be patient, wait for the opportunity, that’s how the NFL is — if you [have] to pass, we pass; if you [have] to run, we run.”
The Steelers might have to run against the Ravens, who lead the NFL in total defense and are second against the pass (169.3 yards per game). They are one of only four teams that has not allowed a completion of 40 yards or longer. And they are doing that without their best cornerback, Jimmy Smith, who is serving a four-game suspension.
Conversely, the Ravens rank 13th against the run, allowing an average of 103.7 yards per game, and don’t know if Pro Bowl linebacker C.J. Mosley will return from a knee injury. Mosley did not play in last week’s victory against the Denver Broncos, who rushed for 120 yards on 24 carries and two touchdowns.
Conner was understandably running with both arms around the ball in the late stages in Tampa, making sure not to do what he did in Cleveland. At some point, Fichtner said, he will get more comfortable in those instances, and more long runs will result.
“That’s going to come in time, but I can appreciate where he’s at,” Fichtner said. “We put ourselves in a position where we didn’t win a game [in Cleveland] and we took turns turning the ball over and he wasn’t going to let that happen. As he keeps growing and trusting himself, some of those might be exploded finished runs.”