Steelers’ Puzzling TNF Woes Continue With Stunning Loss To Bengals

The Pittsburgh Steelers are usually a pretty good football team on Sundays, but on Thursdays they look more like the Cleveland Browns.

The Steelers’ Thursday Night Football woes continued in Week 7 with their stunning 33-31 road loss to the Cincinnati Bengals, snapping their three-game winning streak.

Pittsburgh is now 2-10 in TNF road games under Mike Tomlin, including 0-7 in TNF road games against AFC North opponents. For whatever reason, Tomlin’s teams continue to underperform during short weeks.

The Steelers looked poised to reverse those trends after jumping out to a 10-0 lead early in the second quarter. They allowed the Bengals to score 17 unanswered points to end the half, however, while Aaron Rodgers uncharacteristically threw two interceptions.

Pittsburgh clawed back to take a 31-30 lead with a little under three minutes remaining, but its defense was unable to stop Joe Flacco and Cincinnati’s resurgent offense. Evan McPherson drilled the go-ahead 36-yard field goal with seven seconds left, sealing the Bengals’ first win since Week 2 and cutting the Steelers’ lead over them to 1.5 games in the AFC North standings.

Mike Tomlin is still searching for his first road victory on TNF against an AFC North opponent 😳 pic.twitter.com/FjTY77BzLp

— Sports Illustrated (@SInow) October 17, 2025

Rodgers played well despite the two picks, especially in the second half. He didn’t get sacked and finished with four touchdown passes — all to tight ends — with a season-high 249 passing yards.

Jaylen Warren was also phenomenal, racking up a season-high 127 rushing yards on 16 carries and 31 receiving yards on four catches.

However, Pittsburgh’s defense had no answer for Flacco, Ja’Marr Chase and Chase Brown. Flacco surprisingly outdueled Rodgers by throwing for 342 yards and three touchdowns while heavily targeting Chase, who hauled in 16 catches for 161 yards and a touchdown. Meanwhile, Cincinnati’s ground game finally woke up with 142 rushing yards, including 108 from Bown on just 11 carries.

While both offenses were firing, the Steelers’ defense simply couldn’t come up with a stop when it needed to. It only sacked Flacco twice and didn’t force any turnovers, regressing after several strong showings and turning in its worst performance of the season thus far.

Now 4-2, Pittsburgh has a tough three-game stretch coming up against the Green Bay Packers, Indianapolis Colts and Los Angeles Chargers. Fortunately for the Steelers, they don’t have any more Thursday Night Football games this year.

Pittsburgh will try to bounce back against the Packers on Sunday Night Football in Week 8 at home, where the field should be better after being replaced this week.

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