The Cincinnati Bengals, somehow, were in a position to beat the Pittsburgh Steelers tonight and pissed it all away with a couple of boneheaded penalties from Vontaze Burfict and Pacman Jones. Trailing 16-15 with the ball at midfield, the Steelers had 22 seconds to get into manageable field goal range. Roethlisberger threw long for Antonio Brown on first down, but it sailed over his hands. Burfict then came in, hit Brown in the head with his shoulder pads, and then Brown's head ricocheted into Chris Lewis-Harris's helmet. Brown immediately exhibited the fencing response and was on the ground for a while. Burfict was given a 15-yard penalty for the hit, which put Pittsburgh in field goal range. Then Pacman was hit with another 15 yards for shoving Steelers linebackers coach Joey Porter in the middle of the field, making it a chip shot. Naturally Chris Boswell hit the 35-yarder for the win.But it could have been so different.
Trailing by five, just inside the two minute warning, A.J. McCarron tossed a ball down the near sideline to A.J. Green on third-and-seven and Green was able to haul it in and muscle his way another two yards to the end zone. They tried for a two-point conversion, but it failed, so they held a narrow 16-15 lead.
It looked like they might have gone a long way to sealing the victory on the next possession when Burfict intercepted Landry Jones, in for the injured Roethlisberger, but they gave it right back on a fumble on the very next play.Roethlisberger came back into the game at that point, but was unable to move them far enough downfield to put them in position for a field goal attempt, until the Bengals helped him out.[CBS]
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