Pittsburgh Steelers vs New England Patriots
Heinz Field
December 16th, 2018
On the second day in Pittsburgh, I wanted to explore the city a little bit before heading to Heinz Field for one of the biggest games of the 2018 season. Last night I went to the Pens game, today I searched out the old Forbes Field outfield wall as well as the home plate. Then I made my way over to Bicycle Heaven where they had thousands of amazing new and vintage bikes (some from the 1890’s, 1930’s cruisers, the words fastest bike in the 80s and one of Pee Wee Herman’s bikes). It was great to check out some spots in the Burgh before walking to the Stadium.
Outside Heinz I got some cool pictures of the large inflatable Steelers player, the huge Christmas tree, The Tribute to Children monument and the Manchester Bridge Sculpture. But the really exciting exhibits are in the stadium. Pittsburgh is one of the only sporting venues that truly celebrates their team and players. The Hall of Fame walk in the concourse area, there is a ton to see including the Hall of Honor, old locker set ups with former Steeler memorabilia, past Super Bowl championship trophies, all the Terrible Towels since the 1970’s, the first game ball used at Heinz Field, the history of the Steelers logo, old uniforms, essentially everything you can imagine about this historic team. They did a great job of spacing out the items so spectators have the opportunity to see it all and not be surrounded by hundreds of people.
Making my way from the concourse I decide to traverse around the inside of the stadium to get pictures from all sorts of angles. I like this venue because it truly is set up for the home team. Bright yellow seats, Steeler logos everywhere, and to top it off the building is right on the Allegheny River where it splits with the Monongahela River, thus the reason why it is called “Three Rivers”. The views from the nose bleeds are spectacular. I took a bunch of selfies as well as panoramic shots before the fans started to trickle in for game time.
The Patriots are 9-5, the Steelers are 8-4-1. But over the past 5 or so years the Patriots have had the Steelers number. Somehow, some way Brady always seems to pull off a comeback and break the Pittsburgh fans hearts. It also doesn’t help that the Steeler have already lost 3 in a row. The always strong and steady Steelers “curtain” defense has been shaky the past few weeks and they really needed to step it up to have a chance, and that is exactly what they did. Brady was kept to 279 yards of passing and only one TD while Roethlisberger went 235 with 2 TDs, but more importantly Pittsburgh shot down the NE receivers. Gronkowski only had 5 receptions for a measly 2 yards, Edelman had the yards but nothing to show for it in terms of points, while Jaylen Samuels had a spectacular day of rushing for the Steelers with 142 hard fought yards and Antonio Brown was impressive with one of the two passing TD’s.
The game really came down to inches. Chris Boswell missed a field goal early in the game (which he has been doing a lot lately) which was critical to the outcome. It was actually kind of sad when he came out the fans all started to boo, almost wishing for him to miss…which he did. But he was able to hit a 48 yarder toward the end of the game to put the Steelers up by 7 with a little more than 2 minutes left in the game. Normally that would be sufficient for a team to pull out a win, but again these are the Patriots led by Tom Brady. You could feel the tension in the 38 degree air every time he would step back to make a throw. Slowly but surely the offense was making it down the field and with seconds left on the clock, the Pats had one final chance to tie (or win if Belichick wanted to go for 2…which he would), but the Steelers defense stepped up and the place exploded. I have not seen a crowd that happy with a win in a long time. It was made even better seeing off of the “Massholes” completely decked out in Patriots gear, heads down in shame. You just knew what they would have been like if New England pulled off a win.
The one memory of the game that I can’t get out of my head is the nutty Steelers fan behind me. For the final 10 minutes of the game he kept screaming “Let’s GO! Let’s GOOO! LET’S GOOOOO!!!!” all while banging on my seat. His wife tried to calm him down because he was making everyone around him go deaf, but he was having none of it. I get it, I am really excited about my team and their wins as well, but this was a regular season show down. He was acting like it was the super bowl. Maybe for him it was. Also, Terrell Edmunds looks just like Steve Urkel with long hair...just saying.
It was a great weekend, I knocked out the last two games in the Pittsburgh area. I think the next time I come east at this time I will need to see if I can check off the Buffalo Bills and Sabres. I’ll need to check the Kings schedule for 2019-2020.
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