Defenses Paving the Way to Dallas

[Flasteel]

The team with the better defense has won each of the divisional games this weekend. Beyond that, a look at the top defenses in points and yards allowed shows a pretty significant correlation with who's left standing:

Scoring Defense
1 Pittsburgh Steelers 14.5
2 Green Bay Packers 15.0
3 Baltimore Ravens 16.9
4 Chicago Bears 17.9
5 Atlanta Falcons 18.0
6 New York Jets 19.0
7 New Orleans Saints 19.2
8 New England Patriots 19.6

Defense Yards Allowed
1 San Diego Chargers 271.6
2 Pittsburgh Steelers 276.8
3 New York Jets 291.5
4 New Orleans Saints 306.2
5 Green Bay Packers 309.1
6 Miami Dolphins 309.3
7 New York Giants 310.8
8 Minnesota Vikings 312.6
9 Chicago Bears 314
.
.
.
25 New England Patriots 366.5

By this metric, the Jets will hold on with their defense and this lead. If it plays out, we're playing Green Bay in the Super Bowl.

[Irongut]

Re: Defenses Paving the Way to Dallas

Defense saved the day yesterday.

28 yards total offense allowed in the second half, 3 pts allowed and 3 turnovers.

I never have a doubt whether the defense will be there.

[Flasteel]

Re: Defenses Paving the Way to Dallas

The defensive trend continues...as predicted.

[Irongut]

Re: Defenses Paving the Way to Dallas

The defensive trend continues...as predicted.

Even the NFL rule changes can't stop LeBeau from dominating.

[hawaiiansteel]

Re: Defenses Paving the Way to Dallas

Defensive efforts drive Jets, Bears, Packers and Steelers

By Nate Davis, USA TODAY


The headlines are bound to focus on one team closing in on a record seventh Super Bowl title, one trying to break a 42-year championship drought and two more that have met 181 times. The sidebars doubtless will feature four quarterbacks who were first-round draft picks but have had to overcome some measure of adversity to lead their respective teams to the conference championship games.

But with a pair of Super Bowl berths at stake Sunday, rivalries and matinee idols could very well take a back seat to defense — the determining factor to winning championships, according to the old cliché.

It certainly moved the momentum in the divisional round.

"When you make plays on defense, you are going to come out on top," said Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker LaMarr Woodley, whose team survived the Baltimore Ravens 31-24 on Saturday thanks in large part to the defense's second-half heroics.

But in an era when offensive stars dot the highlight reels and fuel fantasy football, Woodley and Co. aren't the only ones optimistic because of the guys who get paid to make the tackles.

"We feel good about where we're at. I know the defense is feeling it," said Green Bay Packers linebacker Clay Matthews, who had 13½ sacks in the regular season and has had three in the team's two playoff wins, including Saturday's 48-21 trouncing of the top-seeded Atlanta Falcons.

The Steelers (232) and Packers (240) allowed the fewest points during the season and racked up the most sacks with 48 and 47, respectively. They'll be joined next weekend by the Chicago Bears— who allowed the fourth-fewest points (286) and trailed only the Steelers in rushing yards allowed — and the New York Jets, who ranked sixth in points allowed (304) and third overall but saved their best performance for Sunday, when they frustrated the top-seeded New England Patriots and their league-best scoring offense 28-21.

"Mission impossible — now we go to Round 3," said Jets coach Rex Ryan, whose team draws the Steelers after vanquishing the Indianapolis Colts and Patriots in successive weeks.

The litany of defensive stars moving on is impressive.

It includes four of the last five defensive players of the year — Chicago's Brian Urlacher (2005), New York's Jason Taylor (2006, with the Miami Dolphins), Pittsburgh's James Harrison (200 and Green Bay's Charles Woodson (2009) — plus Matthews and Steelers safety Troy Polamalu, front-runners for the honor in 2010.

Scoring could be at a premium when you factor in potentially inclement weather in Chicago and Pittsburgh along with four other Pro Bowlers, including Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis— whom Ryan has deemed the best player in the league — and Bears defensive end Julius Peppers, the crown jewel of last offseason's free agent class.

"He's awesome — No. 1," Urlacher says of his teammate, who has helped restore the roar for the Monsters of the Midway. "He's everything we thought he would be and more."

The NFL's final four teams will need even more out of their defenses to stay on the road to Super Bowl XLV.

Jets frustrate Brady

The Jets cleaned up the Patriots after a week's worth of trash talk and continue their quest for their first Super Bowl victory since the 1968 season.

The Jets got three touchdown passes from second-year quarterback Mark Sanchez, who notched his fourth postseason win while avoiding the turnovers he's often criticized for.

But Ryan's defense will get most of the accolades after picking off Tom Brady, who hadn't been intercepted in a record 335 consecutive attempts to end the regular season, once and sacking him five times while holding New England more than 11 points below its scoring average.

"This isn't the first time we've ever played good on defense," said Ryan, whose team beat the Steelers 22-17 at Heinz Field on Dec. 19. "We know a little bit about defense."

When Brady had time to throw, he struggled to find open receivers, and many of the Jets' sacks came because of their often-impermeable coverage.

"This is how we drew it up," said Revis, who said the scheme stressed tight coverage and small throwing windows for Brady.

New England converted five of 14 third downs and scored 10 points in the final two minutes when the Jets were safely ahead.

Brady "was a little confused out there," Revis said.

Old rivals square off

The Bears shattered the Seattle Seahawks' glass slipper with a suffocating defensive performance in Sunday's 35-24 win.

"We stopped the run early, we got off the field on third down, got pressure on the quarterback," Urlacher said.

After racking up 41 points and 415 yards in their wild-card upset of the New Orleans Saints, Seattle managed 111 yards and a field goal in the first three quarters before Chicago reverted to soft zones in the fourth quarter, when Seattle scored 21 points and made the game look far more competitive than it was. The Seahawks converted three of 14 third downs, rushed for 34 yards and punted nine times.

"We just didn't give them any chances, I guess," Urlacher said.

Now the Bears are in a new situation. They'll next play the Packers for a league-record 182nd time — but for only the second time in the postseason. They last squared off for the Western Division title in December 1941, a week after Pearl Harbor was bombed.

"It just doesn't get any better than the NFC championship coming down to the Packers coming down on our turf," Bears coach Lovie Smith said.

Chicago quarterback Jay Cutler knows the challenge ahead is foreboding. "We're both familiar with each other," he said of the teams, which split this season. "We have our hands full."

'D' helps to lead Pack

Green Bay's Aaron Rodgers is arguably the hottest quarterback going after skewering the Falcons for 366 passing yards and three touchdowns, plus one on the ground.

But he credited his defense for taking the air out of Atlanta.

"The play of the game was (cornerback) Tramon Williams' pick," Rodgers said of Williams' 70-yard interception return for a touchdown to end the first half, when the Falcons were positioning themselves for a field goal that would have cut their deficit to 21-17.

Woodson has been impressed with Williams, who took over for Al Harris at cornerback and clinched the wild-card win vs. the Philadelphia Eagles by intercepting Michael Vick in the end zone to preserve a 21-16 lead.

"He's playing lights-out football," Woodson said of Williams on Fox's Sunday telecast.

The Packers defense — which has allowed seven points or fewer six times this season despite losing three starters to injured reserve — limited the Falcons to a season-low 194 yards while adding five sacks of Matt Ryan and four turnovers.

Steelers rise in second half

The Steelers are coming back for more after their defense seemed to will them to victory as it has so many times in the franchise's storied history, which includes six Super Bowl titles.

Trailing 21-7 at the half, Pittsburgh scored 17 consecutive points by generating three turnovers in the third quarter.

Ben Roethlisberger put the nail in the coffin with a 58-yard pass to Antonio Brown with 1:58 to go, setting up Rashard Mendenhall's game-winning TD run.

But revered coordinator D!ck LeBeau's defense — which has largely served as the foundation of the Steelers' two titles since 2005 — set the stage.

"To be down like that and come out at halftime, I know a lot of people probably were counting us out," Woodley said. "We came back and we fought. When the offense is down, the defense is going to pick them up. And when the defense is down, the offense is going to pick up."

[url="http://www.usatoday.com/sports/football/nfl/2011-01-16-nfl-playoffs-defense_N.htm"]http://www.usatoday.com/sports/football ... ense_N.htm[/url]