Mike Tomlin’s Post Game Comments After The Win Over Cleveland

Head Coach Mike Tomlin: Necessary win for us. We’re cognizant of what is going on in other stadiums but that bed has been made weeks ago. I do appreciate the efforts today in terms of doing what we needed to do in our stadium. We’ll wait like everyone else to see what happens. But obviously, I’m proud of the group, their ability to stay singularly focused, to fight the fight that’s in front of them, to put some of our past transgressions behind us, largely speaking. Not only today, but over the second half of the season. It’s been a trying journey, but it’s been a rewarding one in a lot of ways from a growth standpoint. Hopefully we get an opportunity to continue forward. On the injury front, a few minor ones. Jerricho Cotchery hurt his ribs. I don’t know the status of him in regards to potentially next week. Steve McLendon re-aggravated his ankle. We’ll evaluate both guys. But largely a good effort, a necessary win and we’ll move forward hopefully.

Through the course of this did you ever allow yourself to consider possible playoff scenarios or was it kind of tunnel vision?
We had to do what we needed to do in our stadium and that’s where we tried to remain focused. We saw the highlights and scoreboard and everything like everyone else, but that’s irrelevant. We needed to be concerned with what was going on in our stadium and largely I thought the group collectively was able to do that.

Being that you guys faced adversity in the beginning of the season, do you consider the second half of this season one of your better coaching efforts?
I’m not into evaluating my performance. I’m into winning games with this group and we were able to do enough over the second half to put ourselves in position to be where we are, and for that I’m thankful.

Antonio Brown set a record to be the first player to have over five catches and 50 yards in every game in a season. Can you speak about him?
He’s a hard worker. He’s our team MVP. He’s highly productive. He wants to be one of the key reasons why we’re successful. He’s just got all the makings of a guy on the upswing in his career and it’s good to see production to go along with those types of efforts.