The Pittsburgh Steelers entered Sunday’s game with the fifth-ranked run defense, averaging about 93 yards allowed on the ground per game, facing a home team Seattle Seahawks team that led the league in averaging about 148 yards on the ground per game.
They were facing the Seahawks’ hot hand rookie rusher Thomas Rawls, who came into the game averaging six yards per carry. He finished the game with 81 yards, but he did so on 21 hard-earned attempts, averaging about 3.85 yards per carry, with no explosive runs.
In all, the Steelers defense gave up precisely 100 rushing yards, including 14 from quarterback Russell Wilson, and 17 yards was the longest run that they allowed on 27 total rushing attempts, which is a surprisingly high number considering how well they did through the air, but that all came on just 30 attempts.