BALTIMORE – Safety DeShon Elliott didn’t mince his words after the Pittsburgh Steelers’ 28-14 AFC Wild Card loss on Saturday night.

Despite only being with the organization for a season, Elliott made it clear how frustrated he was with the Steelers’ pointless cycle: a regular-season record above .500 followed by a one-off playoff appearance.

“I know in the past we’ve played well to start the season and then we’ll just get out of bed at the end, and the same thing happened this year,” Elliott said after the Steelers game. sixth playoff loss in eight seasons. “The season ended with a five-game losing streak, including the playoffs. So we had to find out what the problem was. We had to figure out how to get better. We need to figure out how to get past this point. We’ve had to figure out how to finish the season strong to get to the playoffs.

The Steelers have taken different routes each year to get to this point, but the goal is the same. In their final two playoff appearances before the 2024 season, the Steelers rebounded despite slow starts to secure a playoff spot in the final week of the season. In 2020, they started 11-0 before losing four of their last five games. And in 2017, they won the AFC North and hosted the Jacksonville Jaguars after a first-round bye. But each of those appearances ended the same way the Steelers’ season ended Saturday night in Baltimore: with a loss in their only playoff game.

“I’m just evaluating what happened tonight,” Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said when asked about the pattern of individual incidents in the playoffs. “As I told you earlier this week, these are my bags, not this collective’s bags. So my energy goes to that group there and what they were willing to give and the journey that we’ve been on this year. “Certainly it ended disappointingly tonight.

Saturday night was a repeat of the same nightmare that played out in each of those postseason losses. The Steelers fell behind early and trailed 21-0 at halftime, marking their second-largest playoff halftime deficit behind the 25-point deficit to the Browns in 2020.

“Losing sucks,” said edge rusher TJ Watt, who didn’t record a tackle or a sack and had five quarterback pressures. “Having five losses in a row to end the season sucks. We felt like we had a good week of preparation behind us. We felt like we were ready for this week. We weren’t. We couldn’t stop the run. We didn’t.” We couldn’t stop the run. So it was tough in the last month of football.

Since losing to the New England Patriots in the 2016 AFC Championship Game, the Steelers have totaled 96 points and passed for 641 yards in their last six playoff losses. “It’s tough in a game, but I can’t complain about it,” said defensive tackle Cameron Heyward, who has been with the team in its last six playoff losses. “They’re going to make plays, but we have to make our own plays and we didn’t do that.”

The Ravens started making those plays on their first possession, as MVP candidate Lamar Jackson and running back Derrick Henry combined for 71 rushing yards during a drive that ended with a 15-yard touchdown catch by Rashod Bateman. The Ravens had even more success with the ball on their second scoring drive, running the ball exclusively during the 98-yard series capped by Henry’s 8-yard touchdown. At the end of the night, the Ravens racked up 299 rushing yards in what was once a stout Steelers run defense.

“It’s worse to run 300 yards toward you than to pass 300 yards,” Elliott said. “It was like a will. They definitely put their belt on their asses today.”

As was the case during the Steelers’ four-game losing streak to end the regular season, defensive players struggled to articulate what needed to change, not just in Saturday night’s loss but also in a season-ending slide and the recent overtime of playoff defeats.

“It’s too fresh,” Watt said. “I don’t know it. I have no answers. Of course, if I had the answers, I would have done something different this week. I felt like we had a good week, a good week of preparation. I felt like we had a relatively healthy team, especially on defense, putting the pads on. I felt like we had a physical training week and it didn’t line up.”

Watt later added: “If I had the answer, we wouldn’t be here right now. I need to look in the mirror and have some conversations, but I don’t have any answers.”

Although they couldn’t say exactly what corrections were needed, players who spoke out after the game unanimously said the problem wasn’t Tomlin.

“Mike’s message doesn’t worry me,” Heyward said. “I’m worried about our technique and our execution. That’s what I’m really worried about. I just wish we had played a lot better. It’s not a message, it’s not groundbreaking, but there were opportunities that we could take advantage of and we didn’t confiscate anything.