The dust has settled on the NFL's Wild Card weekend, but the sting of defeat remains in four lonely locker rooms. The Cincinnati Bengals, Detroit Lions, Atlanta Falcons and yes, this guy's Pittsburgh Steelers all watched in dismay as the clock struck midnight on their Super Bowl dreams.
We'll start with the final, and undoubtedly most exciting, game of the weekend. The Steelers and Broncos went head-to-head on Sunday night in what looked to be a lopsided affair heading in. The Steel Curtain once again led the NFL in defense and sported the league's best pass defense. Denver hobbled into the playoffs through the backdoor losing there final 3 games, but getting some help when Oakland lost to San Diego on the final day of the season.
The league looked like they had finally written the blueprint on how to stop the elusive Tim Tebow as Denver's offense had sputtered to end the season with Tebow struggling mightily. In the final two regular season games the Broncos scored a total of 17 points and Tebow looked awful going a combined 19/51 for only 245 yards while throwing 4 picks and losing 2 fumbles. Coming up against a Pittsburgh team who hadn't allowed a receiver to have 100 yards all season long and led the NFL in pass defense, it looked as though Denver's playoff run would be short lived. But this is the NFL now isn't it.
Without making excuses, the Steelers limped into this game having being bitten hard by the injury bug and the Broncos took full advantage. Leading tackler and safety Ryan Clark sat the game out with a blood disorder that doesn't allow him to play at high altitudes. Center Maurkice Pouncey watched from the sidelines with an ankle injury and leading rusher Rashard Mendenhall an ACL tear. The loss of Clark really hurt the Steelers secondary as cornerback Ike Taylor was exposed time and time again including the final 80 yard touchdown pass in overtime. Furthering the issue, Ben Roethlisberger was clearly not 100 percent with the lingering high ankle sprain he suffered against Cleveland in week 16.
Injuries aside, this was not the same Tim Tebow the NFL has watched run all over teams in his first season as a starter. Tebow was crisp, accurate and borderline perfect with the one thing the world felt was his downfall; his arm. He torched the Steelers secondary for 316 yards on only 10 completions and made Demaryius Thomas the first wide receiver to have a 100 yard game against the Curtain this season. Thomas finished with 4 catches for 204 yards and took Tebow's final pass 80 yards on the first play in overtime for a touchdown. Tebow mania will live on for at least another week after the 29 -23 OT win while the Steelers return to Pittsburgh licking their wounds and looking toward next season.
In the other AFC matchup the third ranked Houston Texans rolled to an easy 31 - 10 win over the Cincinnati Bengals. With both starting quarterback Matt Schaub and backup Matt Leinhart lost to injury, rookie TJ Yates led the Texans to their first ever playoff victory. Arian Foster carried most of the load for Houston carrying the ball 24 times for 153 yards and 2 touchdowns while Houston's stout defense contained the Bengals young duo of Andy Dalton and AJ Green.
The Texans defense, ranking 4th in the NFL, suffocated the Bengals playmakers holding running back Cedric Benson to only 14 yards on 7 carries and wide receiver AJ Green to 5 catches for 47 yards. After Benson ran for a short touchdown late in the first quarter the Houston defense limited the Bengals to 3 points the rest of the game including shutting them out in the second half. Defensive End JJ Watt capped a great defensive effort with a 29 yard interception for a touchdown to end the first half and put the Texans up for good. Houston now heads to Baltimore to take on the Ravens in a matchup of 2 of the better defenses in the NFL.
In the NFC, the two games featured polar opposite styles of play. The Saints and Lions hooked up in, go figure, a track meet in New Orleans. Here's a newsflash for those of you who don't read the paper, Drew Brees is pretty good. Brees went 33/43 for 466 yards and 3 touchdown passes while continuing his assault on opposing defenses. The Saints offense exploded once again for 45 points as 8 different players caught a pass from Brees. Sparkplug and all purpose back Darren Sproles had 51 yards on the ground and 34 through the air while scoring 2 of the Saints 6 touchdowns.
On the other side of the ball the Detroit Lions put up some gaudy numbers of their own. Matthew Stafford threw for 380 yards with 3 touchdowns, while Calvin 'Megatron' Johnson caught 211 of those yards and had 2 touchdowns. In the end, the Lions were outclassed and outmatched by the Saints and fell 45 - 28. Detroit, however, can take solace in their bright future ahead and fans should begin to see playoff football on a regular basis in Detroit with this young and talented core.
In the other NFC tilt the New York Giants continued their impressive late season run and threw up a defensive shutout against the Atlanta Falcons. The Giants defeated the Falcons 24 - 2 with the only points coming from the Falcons defense on a first quarter safety when Eli manning was called for intentional grounding in his own endzone. The ground and pound duo of Brandon Jacobs and Ahmad Bradshaw ran for 155 yards and allowed the Giants to win the time of possession by almost 10 minutes.
After last years embarrassing loss at home to Green Bay, the Falcons must be wondering if Matt Ryan is the real deal. Ryan went 24/41 with only 199 yards and no touchdowns against the Giants and was stopped twice on 4th and inches while the Falcons were in Giants territory. The Falcons head into the offseason trying to figure out what went wrong while the Giants will march into Lambeau field next week to take on the mighty Packers in a rematch of their week 13 matchup where the Giants almost ended the Packers perfect season.
Wild Card weekend has come to an end and eight remaining teams still have aspirations of holding the Lombardi trophy in February. The Divisional round begins this Saturday in San Francisco and is shaping up to be another exciting weekend of football. I'll have a preview of each game beginning tomorrow and running until Friday so stay tuned.
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