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The Steelers running game has been up and down so far this season, with Rashard Mendenhall rushing for 67 yards against Seattle, while the offense amassed 126 yards on the ground, most of that in the first half.

The numbers weren’t so good in the other two games, with Mendenhall gaining only 45 yards against the Ravens in the season opener and just 37 yards against Colts, while the team managed just 66 and 67 yards rushing respectively in those two games.

“I’ll acknowledge that we didn’t do well the other night and that we better improve in that area and improve in a hurry because we desire to be balanced offensively,” said Coach Mike Tomlin. “One thing that I didn’t mention about Sunday’s performance was that even though we struggled in terms of running the football, our ability to convert third downs helped us in that area in terms of moving the football and not allowing it to be a detriment of what we were trying to do offensively in terms of possessing the football and in terms of scoring.”

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Wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders is a player who is known for his smarts on the field, but probably would like to have a do-over after a gaffe in the Colts game.

Ben Roethlisberger overthrew Sanders and Colts defensive back Joe Lefeged intercepted at the Colts 48-yard line. Sanders could have downed Lefeged, but instead leapt over him without touching him and Lefeged got up and returned the ball 25 yards.

Tomlin said that Sanders knew he made a mistake, and it wasn’t something that needed to be addressed.

“Really, there was no need to talk to him,” said Tomlin. “He understood where he was wrong. Sometimes coaching the obvious is silly. That’s a mistake that was made and acknowledged immediately. It’s probably more important that we moved on to things that were less obvious.”
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After Sunday night’s game Tomlin was asked about a timeout he took with eight seconds still remaining on the clock before bringing Shaun Suisham out for the game-winning field goal. The timeout allowed the Colts to still run another play, but at the time Tomlin didn’t think twice about it.

“Just in case we had a ball-handling issue or anything of that nature,” said Tomlin of the timing after the game. “We wanted to preserve enough time to do it again if necessary. It wasn’t going to go down on one play. If we had a low snap or something we could afford to lose the four or five yards or whatever and re-kick the ball if necessary.”

What Tomlin didn’t realize at the time was that it was the team’s final timeout, while he was thinking they still had one left.

“I didn’t realize that until after,” admitted Tomlin. “I lost that timeout when Jonathan Scott went down in that sequence of events. I have to get better too. I am a guy in development from a game management standpoint. I don’t run away from that.”