Steelers survive wild ending to top Ravens

Pittsburgh needed a late field goal by Jeff Reed to beat Baltimore, 20-19.
By TOM WILLIAMS
VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF
PITTSBURGH -- The Steelers are used to seeing tailback Jerome Bettis, wide receiver Hines Ward and quarterback Ben Roethlisberger receive plenty of face time on Monday Night Football.
That the Steelers (5-2) can win when such Not-Ready-for-Prime-Time players like long snapper Greg Warren, special teams up-man Sean Morey and placekicker Jeff Reed get screen time in the final minutes, said something about their resiliency.
During Monday's 20-19 win over the Ravens, more was said about Warren and Morey in the fourth quarter than had been heard about them since training camp.
Freak play
A freak play on fourth-quarter punt attempt gave the Ravens' new life and the Steelers one last chance for Roethlisberger to jump-start a stalled offense.
"You don't want a team to hang around all day, especially when anything can happen," said Ward after catching eight passes for 75 yards. "But it came down to that."
With the Steelers clinging to a 17-16 lead with six minutes to play, punter Chris Gardocki lined up at about the Pittsburgh 35. The snap never reached him.
Morey had moved behind Warren and was barking signals. Warren thought he heard his trigger word and snapped the ball into Morey's feet.
"He was making another set of calls and I didn't realize that he was still behind me. I just prematurely reacted," said Warren, a rookie from North Carolina.
When did he know the play had gone awry?
"Right when I did it -- I heard the thud," Warren said.
Morey scooped up the ball and tossed it back to Gardocki, who threw an incomplete pass, giving the Ravens the ball at the Pittsburgh 45.
That's when the real fun began.
The Ravens ran five plays to set up placekicker Matt Stover's 47-yard field goal, his fourth of the game, that put Baltimore ahead, 19-17, with 3:27 to go.
Rapid response
The Steelers offense, which had been frustrated by the Ravens' ability to contain their vaunted running game, responded with an eight-play drive that produced the winning points on a Reed's 37-yard field goal with 1:36 to play.
First, Roethlisberger hooked up with wide receivers Antwaan Randle El (14 yards) and Quincy Morgan (23 yards) to move into Ravens' territory.
After Verron Haynes rushed for 7 yards, Bettis bulldozed ahead for 11 yards that gave Reed a chance.
"My role is to come in and spell [starting tailback] Willie [Parker] when he needs it but also when we need those tough yards," said Bettis, who relished the late-game opportunity.
Ward said, "Our offense did a great job of driving back down and kicking the game-winning field goal. That's a sign of a good team to rise to situations like that. We rose to the occasion."
Out of timeouts, Ravens quarterback Anthony Wright, a former Steelers backup, drove his squad to midfield.
But defensive end Brett Keisel's sack on third down followed by an incomplete pass ended the Ravens' (2-5) night and most likely their playoff hopes.
Moral of story
"Good teams survive and that's what we did," center Jeff Hartings said. "That's what we have to take away from this."
The Steelers won despite posting unimpressive offensive numbers -- 101 rushing yards on 28 tries. Parker gained 63 of them on 14 carries.
Hartings said the Ravens were thwarting the run by stuffing line of scrimmage.
"With eight up there, it's going to be hard to run the ball," Hartings said. "I thought we did all right, but we were getting 2-3 yards instead of 6-7. We had some tough third-down situations. At the end, it felt good to run the ball and kick the field goal."
Roethlisberger completed 18-of-30 tosses for 177 yards, including two touchdowns to rookie tight end Heath Miller.
"They had eight in the box and when they do that, you have to be able to complete some passes," said Bettis who had 22 yards on eight carries. "We were a little shaky early in the first half and unable to make them pay."
On the first drive, Roethlisberger suffered an injury to his right knee and had an MRI taken Tuesday.
Cowher said there is no ligament damage to the second-year quarterback's knee. More information is expected later in the week.
williams@vindy.com