PITTSBURGH — Maybe it's because I'm from Buffalo, but from this vantage point, conference championship games feel just as big and sometimes bigger than Super Bowls. That's especially true the first time around, which was Bills 51, Raiders 3, if I recall correctly. (And how could I forget?)
One's entire football existence — as a player, fan or coach — is geared toward getting to the Super Bowl, right? Getting there is more than half the battle. Cities go nuts when their team reaches the Super Bowl. It feels like a championship.
It is a championship.
Yes, it stinks to lose the Super Bowl (never mind four in a row), but the path to the summit, to the game itself, is littered with carcasses. Many never arrive.
Which is a long way of saying the fine citizens of Kansas City, Cincinnati and San Francisco — plus people who live in Philadelphia — are quivering with excitement this week as their teams stand on the precipice of the biggest prize in American sports: a trip to the Super Bowl.
There is no better sports weekend, and it should remind you of how fortunate you are — or at least how fortunate you were, back when the Steelers weren't touting all the positives of nine-win seasons. Your team has appeared in an NFL-record 16 conference title games, 11 of them here.
So let's rank them, shall we? Not in terms of quality of game but rather in scale of emotions, from despondency to delirium, 16 to one.
See if you agree ...
16 — Jan. 15, 1995, Three Rivers Stadium: Chargers 17, Steelers 13. Dan Rooney once told me his biggest disappointment in football was seeing the Chargers logo painted in the Super Bowl end zone two weeks later at Joe Robbie Stadium. That should have been the Steelers, who were a heavily favored one seed against Stan bleepin' Humphries. But hey, at least the Steelers put out a Super Bowl rap video.
15 — Dec. 26, 1976, Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum: Raiders 24, Steelers 7. This one appears here because of what might have been — a three-peat. Jack Lambert once told NFL Films he believed this was the Steelers' greatest team and that The Chief (Art Rooney) agreed. Sadly, the starting backfield of Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier, each of whom gained 1,000 yards that season, was injured the week before and could not play.
Oh well, I guess it was somebody else's turn to win. This is what Steelers defensive lineman Dwight White told me years later: "Oakland was like Mile High Stadium in Denver, where the fans were right on you. I just remember how antagonistic they were, how happy to finally beat us. They gave us hell, really rejoicing, and I remember thinking, 'Well, good for them.'"
14 — Jan. 27, 2002, Heinz Field: Patriots 24, Steelers 17. Another homefield disaster for Bill Cowher, this one with his team a 10 1/2 -point favorite. It sure looked like the Steelers had the advantage at quarterback, too, with Kordell Stewart going against a rookie named Tom Brady. But this turned out to be one of the games that launched a dynasty, occurring a week after the famous "Tuck Rule Game." Brady would play in 13 AFC Championship Games (so far), winning nine.
13 — Jan. 23, 2005, Heinz Field: Patriots 41, Steelers 27. This, more than any Steelers-Patriots matchup, still has people asking if New England cheated its way to a Super Bowl. The eternal question regarding Bill Belichick's elaborate sign-stealing scheme: If it didn't help him, why did he do it for so long?
From ESPN's 2015 investigative piece on Spygate: "Some of the Steelers' defensive coaches remain convinced that a deep touchdown pass from Brady to Deion Branch in the January 2005 AFC Championship Game came from stolen signals because Pittsburgh hadn't changed its signals all year, sources say, and the two teams had played a game in the regular season that (Patriots employee Matt) Walsh told investigators he believes was taped. 'They knew the signals, so they knew when it went in what the coverage was and how to attack it,' says a former Steelers coach. 'I've had a couple of guys on my teams from New England, and they've told me those things.' "
12 — Jan. 11, 1998, Three Rivers Stadium: Broncos 24, Steelers 21. Cowher's club seemed poised for a fourth-quarter comeback when John Elway clinched the game with a third-and-6 completion to Shannon Sharpe, who would one day become a huge Memphis Grizzlies fan.
11 — Dec. 31, 1972, Three Rivers Stadium: Dolphins 21, Steelers 17. This is a weirdly forgotten game, likely because all anyone rightfully remembers from that year is the Immaculate Reception, which happened eight days earlier. However, if not for Larry Seiple's fake punt, the Steelers might have scored another all-time win by ruining Miami's undefeated season. This game should have been played at the Orange Bowl, but the NFL had a rotating system for conference championships back then.
10 — Jan. 22, 2017, Gillette Stadium: Patriots 36, Steelers 17. It was never going to be easy for the Steelers to beat the 15-2 Patriots. It became infinitely harder when Le'Veon Bell — then on a historic playoff tear — left early. The Steelers sat back in a soft zone defense for most of the game and got absolutely shredded. Tom Brady basically completed every pass he tried. Unbelievably, these were his numbers against the Steelers in six matchups in Foxborough at the time: 171 of 239 for 2,147 yards, 21 touchdowns and no interceptions.
9 — Jan. 6, 1985, Orange Bowl: Dolphins 45, Steelers 28. This was the closest Chuck Noll came to a Super Bowl after the 1970s, and it wasn't all that close. Dan Marino, the local kid the Steelers bypassed in the 1983 draft, threw for four touchdowns.
8 — Jan. 4, 1976, Three Rivers Stadium: Steelers 16, Raiders 10. It was never a bad thing to beat the Raiders and advance to the Super Bowl, but even one Steelers player told Sports Illustrated afterward the game tape "should be burned before they let anyone else see it." The teams combined for nine fumbles and five interceptions. Raiders owner Al Davis accused the Steelers of intentionally icing the edges of the field, all the better to slow down receiver Cliff Branch, who had 186 yards receiving in the previous year's AFC title game.
7 — Jan. 6, 1980, Three Rivers Stadium: Steelers 27, Oilers 13. For better or worse, this was the game that launched replay review, thanks to Mike Renfro's "no catch" in the back of the end zone. The Steelers pulled away and held Earl Campbell to 15 yards on 17 carries. The Oilers would not return to a conference championship game until after they moved to Nashville 17 years later.
6 — Jan. 23, 2011, Heinz Field: Steelers 24, Jets 19. After a smashing first half, the Steelers held on for dear life against Rex Ryan and Mark Sanchez. They did not clinch the win until Ben Roethlisberger fooled Ryan by passing on third-and-6, connecting with an obscure rookie named Antonio Brown for a first down. Rashard Mendenhall had the game of his life and did not rip Roethlisberger afterward.
5 — Jan. 22, 2006, Invesco Field at Mile High: Steelers 34, Broncos 17. Jerome Bettis & Co. went into Denver as a 3 1/2-point underdog and mostly dominated, sending Bettis to his hometown of Detroit for the Super Bowl. Ben Roethlisberger was electric (21 of 29, 275 yards, two touchdowns). Jake Plummer wasn't.
4 — Jan. 14, 1996, Three Rivers Stadium: Steelers 20, Colts 16. Has Jim Harbaugh's Hail Mary landed yet? Coming off the epic failure against the Chargers a year earlier, Cowher's team hung on at the end, returning the Steelers to the Super Bowl for the first time since 1979 — and they got there despite losing superstar cornerback Rod Woodson in the season opener.
3 — Jan. 7, 1979, Three Rivers Stadium: Steelers 34, Oilers 5. In a Monday night game earlier that season at the same venue, the Oilers stunned the Steelers 24-17 and established themselves as the biggest threat to a potential dynasty. This provided sweet revenge, as the Steel Curtain stifled Earl Campbell on an ice bath of a field — leading to a memorable SI cover headline, "Splashdown to the Super Bowl."
2 — Jan. 18, 2009, Heinz Field: Steelers 23, Ravens 14. I know, I know, for fans of a certain generation, this would easily be No. 1, and for good reason, seeing as it came against the hated Ravens and featured the greatest play in Heinz Field history, courtesy of Troy Polamalu. It also was the most violent championship game I have ever witnessed, typified by Ryan Clark's crushing hit on Willis McGahee. It was incredible. It was excellent. It was a combination of those two words, which would be "incrinculent."
But there is nothing like the first time ...
1 — Dec. 29, 1974, Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum: Steelers 24, Raiders 13. Ask any Steelers fan — or player — of a certain age and they will tell you the first trip to the Super Bowl was the best trip the Super Bowl. Remember, this is a franchise that was formed in 1933 and owned precisely one playoff win at the time.
It's easy to forget the Immaculate Reception did not catapult the Steelers to Super Bowl glory. In fact, the very next season, the Raiders slapped them out of the 1973 playoffs with a 33-14 victory. So this was actually the Steelers' coming-of-age game, to go on the road and hold a great Raiders team to 29 yards rushing.
As told in Sports Illustrated: "After 42 years of winding up each season with a load of zilch, the Pittsburgh Steelers showed their new mettle last Sunday by winning their first meaningful title. You all remember the Steelers, who opened for business back in the first acknowledged Depression and stumbled through the terms of seven U.S. Presidents and three or four wars without ever winning much more than a Kewpie doll for their trophy case. Well, the Same Old Steelers are finally, and profoundly, altered.
"They are the champions of the American Conference."
