Baltimore edged Pittsburgh, 16-14, on the road as quarterback questions loom.
–A clean, run-oriented game enabled the Ravens to break a four-game losing streak to the Pittsburgh Steelers and win on Sunday, 16-14, at the newly renamed Acrisure Stadium in Pittsburgh. Baltimore is 5-4 in one-score games this year.
—The Ravens and Steelers have evenly split their last 32 meetings, with the Ravens holding a slim one-point lead (696-695) over that span. Pittsburgh has a 29-24 lifetime regular-season edge on the Ravens, one of only nine teams that can make that claim.
—Acrisure Stadium, formerly known as Heinz Field, is one of five venues where the Ravens were the first visitors to win a regular-season game after it opened. The others are MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, Nissan Coliseum in Nashville, Empower Field at Mile High in Denver, and FedEx Field in Landover, Maryland.
—The Ravens, who boosted their record to 9-4, have won seven of their last nine games but had to do without the services of quarterback Lamar Jackson and right guard Kevin Zeitler, both deactivated due to knee injuries. Going into this game, Baltimore had been 1-5 without Jackson starting.
—Because of today’s absences, the Ravens are now down to just four offensive players that have started every game: wideout Devin Duvernay, left guard Ben Powers, center Tyler Linderbaum and right tackle Morgan Moses. In place of Zeitler, the Ravens rotated Ben Cleveland and Trystan Colon at right guard.
–Returning to the lineup was running back J.K. Dobbins, giving the Ravens an active Dobbins-Gus Edwards combination for the first time in nearly two seasons since the end of the 2020 regular season. Dobbins (120 yards, 15 carries) ripped off a 44-yard run that set up his own four-yard, first-quarter touchdown, his first since Week Four. The Ravens got off to a 10-0 lead, scoring first for the 11th time in 13 games this season. Thanks to having all its available running backs, Baltimore outrushed Pittsburgh by 215-65. It was the 12th straight game in which the Ravens have outrushed their opponent, a new franchise-record streak.
—On defense, Baltimore has had just three players start all 14 games this year: linebacker Patrick Queen, safety Chuck Clark, and cornerback Marlon Humphrey.
—The Ravens committed no offensive penalties during the entire game and had only five total flags thrown on them throughout the afternoon.
—Meanwhile, Pittsburgh dropped to 5-8 and 2-4 at home. The team had never had a losing record under head coach Mike Tomlin, who assumed the franchise’s reins in 2007, one year before the Ravens hired John Harbaugh.
—The two have now met 32 times, the most among any active pair of head coaches in the league. It is the second-most all-time, trailing only the 49 meetings between Green Bay’s Curly Lambeau and Chicago’s George Halas. The pair have head-coached 24 one-score games against each other, second-most all-time.
–Before today’s turnover-ridden effort, the Steelers had six games this season with no turnovers, tied for the league high.
—With Sunday’s game, the Ravens began a season-closing run of four AFC North Division games in five weeks, including both games against Pittsburgh. The yearly home-and-home series against the Steelers began in Ravens history at the latest point in a season. The Steelers play the return match in Baltimore in Week 17, the season’s next-to-last weekend.
—With 17 combined first-quarter points, the period took 41 minutes to play. But the hardy brand of football allowed the pace to pick up; the game ended after just two hours and 46 minutes, the shortest Ravens game in recent memory and the quickest in 2022.
—The Ravens came into this game with eight straight contests of two or more sacks, the league’s longest current streak. Sunday at Pittsburgh, the Ravens got two more, including a Roquan Smith sack of Kenny Pickett that knocked him out of the game with a first-quarter concussion. The Steelers failed to score an opening-drive touchdown; they have just one such score in their last 22 games.
—Smith would later intercept backup Mitch Trubisky, the Steelers’ first giveaway in their last five games and the Ravens’ 21st takeaway of the season. The number grew just before halftime when Patrick Queen also picked off Trubisky, who happens to be one of only two rookie quarterbacks to have won a game in Baltimore in team history; he led Chicago to a 2017 overtime win in Charm City.
—Safety Marcus Williams also recorded an interception in his first game back from injury, his fourth pickoff of the year.
—Ravens quarterback Tyler Huntley also had to leave the game due to concussion protocol, doing so late in the third quarter. Stepping in for him was Oregon product and street-free agent, Anthony Brown.
—The Steelers were buoyed by the return of longtime kicker Chris Boswell to the lineup, who was taken off injured reserve on Saturday and played for the first time in seven weeks. His 40-yard try early in the fourth quarter was blocked by Calais Campbell, the second time this year Baltimore has blocked a field goal; Malik Harrison got the other. Campbell now has nine career field-goal blocks.
—The Ravens began the day as the No. 3 playoff seed in the AFC and looked to at least hold their position with the win at Pittsburgh.
—Kicker Justin Tucker scored 11 points on the day, including a first-quarter 42-yard field goal that propelled him past Matt Stover as the all-time leading scorer in Ravens history. Stover accumulated 1464 points during the Baltimore portion of his career, and his career mark of 351 made field goals was tied by Tucker, who hasn’t missed a field-goal attempt in Pittsburgh since his rookie season (2012).
—The Ravens wore white jerseys and purple pants on the road for this game, a combination in which the team is now 13-5.
—Baltimore’s defense has not allowed a 100-yard rusher in 22 straight games. For Pittsburgh’s part, it hasn’t had a 100-yard rusher on offense in 14 consecutive contests. The Ravens once had a 50-game defensive streak preventing such rushing performances between 1999-2001.
—The Ravens have now scored points in 332 straight games, the league’s longest current streak, and just 88 points short of the NFL record set by San Francisco (1977-2004). The Ravens haven’t been shut out since Week 2 in 2002, a home-opening, 25-0 defeat at the hands of that year’s eventual Super Bowl champions, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
—Next week will come quickly for the Ravens as they play the road return match against the Cleveland Browns (5-8) at FirstEnergy Stadium on Saturday at 4:30 p.m., the middle game of an NFL Network tripleheader. The Browns are expected to have quarterback Deshaun Watson on the field in his third game back from his 11-game suspension.
