NFL football analyst Matt Williamson will break down each of the Steelers games this season in the Trib’s Steelers Film Study. Here’s what he saw in the Steelers Week 1 victory.

To kick off their 2021 season, the Steelers traveled to a hostile environment and shocked a lot of people by knocking off the Bills, 23-16.

The defense was spectacular and carried the day against one of the NFL’s best offenses. That side of the ball got little to no help for much of the game from the offense as well as starting the first drive of the season deep in their own end after a 75-yard kickoff return.

In last year’s meeting, the Steelers defense did a great job early in the game limiting a great Buffalo passing game by playing a lot of man coverage and blitzing Josh Allen a high percentage of the time. As great as Allen is, there were two areas of his game last year that still needed work: Handing pressure and not fumbling the football.

The Bills eventually pulled away in that game last year against a Steelers defense that was missing several key players and was playing their third game in a 12-day stretch. But Pittsburgh certainly dished out Allen’s most difficult half of football of the regular season to begin that game and the defense allowed just 19 points that afternoon.

Pressuring Allen

On Sunday, we saw plenty of man coverage again — almost exclusively with five or six defensive backs on the field. But we also saw a ton of pressure on Allen, who was the most blitzed quarterback in all of football last year. This time that pressure came with almost no blitzing — which isn’t Steelers-like to say the least. But wow, did it work.

The Steelers defensive front was utterly dominant and again, Allen didn’t handle pressure particularly well. Buffalo’s offensive line was forced into four holding penalties and could have been called for many more. A phenomenal player, this was far from Allen’s best performance, and he left too many passing yards on the field — although Allen did greatly impact the game as a runner.

Allen missed some open receivers deep downfield as well, something that rarely happened in 2020. In fact, Allen completed just 1 of 7 passes that traveled at least 20 yards and fumbling again was an issue for Buffalo’s star quarterback.

Chaz Palla | Tribune-Review Steelers’ linebacker T.J. Watt pressures Bills quarterback Josh Allen on Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021 at Highmark Stadium.  

Rotation up front

The Bills ran 39 plays in the first half and 85 plays throughout the game, but Pittsburgh held up and used its personnel very well. Even with Stephon Tuitt out of the lineup, the Steelers used a rotation on their defensive front — a smart move early in the season when nearly all NFL players are not quite in top game shape quite yet.

Cameron Heyward (56 snaps) very well could have been the best player on the field Sunday, and his superb bull rush down the middle of his blocker was instrumental in coordinating a pass-rush plan to keep Allen within the confines of the pocket. Such a pass-rush strategy is difficult to pull off while still harassing a talent like Allen, but Pittsburgh executed it expertly.

Not be overshadowed by his linemate, Tyson Alualu (53 snaps) was highly effective in his role from start to finish while the backups Chris Wormley (40), Carlos Davis (17) and Isaiah Buggs (8) all showed well in their limited action.

Edge rushing trio 2nd to none

The Steelers usage of their edge pass-rushers was very interesting and effective. The trio of T.J. Watt (69 snaps), Alex Highsmith (46) and Melvin Ingram (54) all played significant snaps and had a massive impact on the game. Pittsburgh showed some looks with two of these players on the same side of the formation. They also moved them pre-snap at times and even lined these impact pass-rushers up off the line of scrimmage. The edge rotation that Pittsburgh now has is second to none in the entire league.

The Steelers got a gift with the Bills’ decision to call a throwback pass on fourth and one in the fourth quarter, but those are also the type of calls you see when the offense is just losing one-on-one matchups up front snap after snap. This also very well could have been Devin Bush’s best day as an NFL player with his reads, pursuit, tackling and coverage.

Strong in secondary

The secondary also had many contributors with Cameron Sutton really standing out and Tre Norwood showing up big in his first NFL game. In fact, seven members of the secondary played significant snaps in Buffalo. Pittsburgh did a great job of keeping a lot of speed and fresh bodies on the field to combat Allen and company and it paid off throughout the entire football game.

But it was Minkah Fitzpatrick on the back end that showed once again why he is the NFL’s premier safety. Fitzpatrick excelled as a deep middle defender, in man coverage against receivers like Cole Beasley, as a “Robber” playing downhill on routes and as just an overall disruptor.

Buffalo’s receivers gained a lot more separation than the final box score would indicate, and Allen left some big plays on the field. But the Steelers bottled up one of the league’s best wide receivers in Stephon Diggs, which is a massive accomplishment in itself especially considering that Allen threw Diggs’ way 13 times.

Wrinkles on offense

On offense, there were new shifts, motions and usage of misdirection from the start that the Steelers hadn’t shown in the preseason, as well as unbalanced line formations. We even saw Dan Moore going in motion on Pittsburgh’s first play from scrimmage.

Expect a lot more of this going forward with Matt Canada in charge of the offense, and it was welcomed to see the Steelers actually utilizing the play-action passing game with about one-third of Ben Roethlisberger’s passes coming off play action.

But there also was a bit too much of the same from last year as well, with a lot of RPO concepts and very short throws. The offensive line was overmatched, the Steelers ran into stacked boxes and didn’t test Buffalo’s defense downfield. Most weeks, the Bills defense is designed to take away the deep ball and big plays downfield, but against the Steelers, they took the opposite approach.

Still, Roethlisberger didn’t attempt a single pass over 20 yards downfield. His average depth of target was just 5.7 yards and the ball came out extremely quick, much like last year.

Chaz Palla | Tribune-Review Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger is pressured by the Bills’ Jordan Porter in the second quarter on Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021 at Highmark Stadium.  

Work in progress

This game was 3-0 in Buffalo’s favor after the first quarter. At the half, Pittsburgh had just 54 yards of total offense at 2.5 yards per play, 7 rushing yards on eight carries and the Steelers possessed the football for just over 12 of a possible 30 minutes of playing time. However, let’s not forget, that was the first half of professional football for four of the Steelers’ major contributors on offense.

To say Pittsburgh’s revamped offensive line is a “work in progress” is probably a bit too kind. Even though Roethlisberger got the ball out very quick, he was still hit six times. The Bills had a lot of defenders near the line of scrimmage, but Pittsburgh’s big men didn’t win their one-on-one battles nearly enough in the running game. None of the linemen were spectacular obviously, but Chukwuma Okorafor’s play at right tackle was the most concerning. Maybe Zach Banner pushes Okorafor out of the starting lineup in a few weeks.

The Steelers wide receivers excelled in contested catch situations — at times bailing out Roethlisberger — and Chase Claypool was Pittsburgh’s most effective player on this side of the ball overall. But give Roethlisberger, who didn’t throw the ball particularly well in this game, credit for trusting his young pass catchers, and this group gave the Bills’ Levi Wallace fits.

It should also be noted that it was JuJu Smith-Schuster that led Pittsburgh’s receivers in snaps played in Buffalo and that James Washington stepped up when he was called upon.

Run game reaction

Canada showed a lot of empty sets with running back Najee Harris detached and tight ends Pat Freiermuth and/or Eric Ebron aligned outside the numbers. This is also something we should expect to see a lot of going forward. Also, Harris showed that pass protection at the NFL level wasn’t too big for him and Freiermuth clearly looks like a rapidly improving blocker.

While it got better in the second half, far too much of Harris’ production as a runner came after first contact as Canada used a combination of zone- and man-blocking concepts. The rookie first round pick also played all 58 snaps in this game, a rarity for any running back.

Chaz Palla | Tribune-Review Steelers running back Najee Harris steps through the tackle attempt by the Bills’ Jordan Power in the fourth quarter on Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021 at Highmark Stadium.  

Special teams impact

Lastly, special teams also played a huge role in this game. The opening kickoff really put Pittsburgh’s defense in a bind to start and two of Pressley Harvin’s punts left something to be desired. The Steelers’ punt block and score was the biggest play of the game.

Also, Pittsburgh had an obvious kickoff plan to leave the ball inside the 5-yard line with very good hang time, and Chris Boswell executed this extremely well. Danny Smith stuck with this approach even after Isaiah McKenzie’s big opening kickoff return. And of course, give Boswell a ton of credit for hitting a huge kick late in this game.

Chaz Palla | Tribune-Review The Steelers’ Chris Boswell celebrates his fourth-quarter field goal against the Bills on Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021 at Highmark Stadium.  

Coach Mike Tomlin chose to kick field goals twice on fourth down instead of going for the touchdown deep in the Bills territory. These decisions deserve scrutiny, especially the second of the two.

But Tomlin’s squad showed fantastic resiliency in a game where Buffalo snapped the ball 27 more times than the Steelers. Pittsburgh won the turnover battle, scored on special teams and knocked off an excellent opponent. And the scheming and game planning by the coaching staff as well as elite execution from the defensive front were massive reasons why.

Chaz Palla | Tribune-Review The Steelers’ Ulysees Gilbert III pick up a blocked punt and returns it for a fourth-quarter touchdown against the Bills on Sunday, Sept. 12, 2021 at Highmark Stadium.  

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