As season goes on, Steelers increasingly reliant on running game

Over the past three games, the Pittsburgh Steelers have had 105 running plays.

That accounts for three of their top four high-carry games of the season and makes for a 16-game pace of 560 carries. That’s a figure they have not topped since 2004.

By comparison, the Steelers had just 345 rushes last season.

“I think it’s fun,” right tackle Matt Feiler said of an older-school approach on offense. “It kind of takes the pressure off of us in pass protection, as well. Run-blocking is fun, especially when you get the momentum going.”

The Steelers have built momentum in the running game in recent weeks, averaging more than 4 yards per carry in that time. They only had averaged at least that much during three of their first 10 games and were averaging just 3.5 yards per carry until this stretch (three of the top four rushing games of the season) that coincides with a three-game winning streak.

Contrast the Steelers’ 105 rushes over their past three games with the 51 rushes they had in their first three games. Last season, the high for carries over any three-game stretch was 88. The 105 carries over the past three games is the most for the Steelers in a like period of time since they had 109 over an October 2017 three-game span.

The Steelers’ commitment to running more, of course, is no surprise given they’ve gone from a future Hall of Famer at quarterback in Ben Roethlisberger to an undrafted rookie in Devlin Hodges. They also, unlike Week 1 at New England, have not fallen far behind any team in recent weeks, the scenario that forces an abandonment of the running game.

Veteran guard David DeCastro downplays the Steelers’ new-found old-school ways.

“We just like being successful. We just like being efficient,” he said. “We don’t like running when there’s 20 guys in the box. We like being efficient and moving the ball and having a good offense because it’s all a team thing.

“Everyone wants to harp on the ‘run game, run game, run game.’ But it’s the NFL. You can’t just out-big boy people that much. That doesn’t really happen. It’s about a lot of scheme, a lot of moving pieces. If you don’t have good receivers and a good quarterback that can have the threat of a pass, they can just stack the box and it’s easy. Everyone wants to make it like it’s simple, ‘Oh you got to run the ball!’ Yeah, OK, (but) we’ve just got to just be efficient.”

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