HEINZ FIELD Steelers face must-win against Cincinnati

Pittsburgh is 19-6 against the Bengals since 1990.
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Ask the Pittsburgh Steelers how it feels playing a win-or-else game against the Cincinnati Bengals with a season winding down, and the response is a puzzled look or a blank stare.
After all, none of these Steelers has played in such a game -- not when it counted, not when a season was on the line, not when the Bengals were in first place and Pittsburgh was trying to catch them.
The Steelers (4-7) and Bengals (6-5) have played in the same division since 1970, yet only a handful of their previous 65 games was as meaningful to both teams as Sunday's game in Pittsburgh.
The Bengals have won five of six, but their next two games are against the team they've spent years trying to catch (Pittsburgh) and the team they're currently pursuing (Baltimore).
Since the Bengals last won their division in 1990, the Steelers have won seven division titles and appeared in four AFC championship games and one Super Bowl.
"They've always played us well, and always played hard, but they've never really found a way to win games. They've always seemed to have bad luck," guard Alan Faneca said Wednesday. "Last year, I remember Corey Dillon being stopped at the goal line [in the Steelers' 29-21 win in Pittsburgh] at the end of the game. Now they're finding a way to overcome things like that.
"That's where you start to make a turnaround with your organization."
Different attitude
Running back Jerome Bettis said it's evident when watching the Bengals that they're playing with the kind of confidence they've lacked for so long.
"They're flying around and playing with a sense of urgency and I believe you couldn't really say that years ago," Bettis said. "That is noticeably different."
So are the circumstances. This is the first time since Cincinnati's 16-12 victory at Three Rivers Stadium on Dec. 2, 1990, that both teams will be in contention -- even if Pittsburgh is only on the fringe of it -- so deep into a season.
That year, the Bengals, Oilers and Steelers tied at 9-7 but, based on tiebreakers, Cincinnati won the AFC Central, Houston got a wild card and Pittsburgh got left out.
Since then, Pittsburgh is 19-6 against Cincinnati, with half those losses coming during consecutive Steelers losing seasons in 1998 and 1999.
"Now they're finding a way to win games, and that's all it takes," Faneca said.
Since that 1990 victory, the only time the Bengals have beaten a contending Steelers team in Pittsburgh was 1997. The Steelers fell to 3-4 with a 27-9 loss to Cincinnati, but rebounded to win their next eight games and eventually made it to the Super Bowl.
Making a run
The Steelers need a similar surge this season to overtake the Bengals and Ravens (6-5). A loss Sunday would all but finish them off -- they'd be three games behind with four remaining -- but a victory would pull them to within a game of Cincinnati.
"We need to build this snowball up and keep going downhill," wide receiver Plaxico Burress said.
Winning two of three hardly constitutes an avalanche, but it beats the stretch of six losses in seven games that got the Steelers into their current fix.
And while their 4-7 record is their worst through 11 games in any Bill Cowher-coached season, the Steelers still have shown the ability to win division games. They're 3-1 in the AFC North, losing only to the Browns in Pittsburgh, and 9-1 in division games the last two seasons.
"They've come on so strong of late, but we won this division the last two times, so all of that is going to make for an exciting game," wide receiver Hines Ward said. "The players know each other very well, and Marvin [Lewis, the Bengals coach] knows our offense. Cincinnati's playing with a lot of confidence, but we're looking forward to the challenge."