Heres what happened sunday!

[pedd]

Nothing more beautiful than winning ugly

BY PAUL DAUGHERTY | ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

PITTSBURGH - What a weird, wart-filled game. For three and a half quarters, momentum danced like the wind inside Heinz Field. Logic swirled like hot dog wrappers tossed from the upper deck. If you're looking for quantifiable explanations to Bengals 28, Steelers 20, you won't find them here.

That win - Cincinnati's most important, it says here, in Marvin Lewis' four-year tenure - can only be defined by something that can't be counted, replayed or highlighted.

Bengals All Grown Up. Film at 11.

That's what it amounted to. You can chew on the strangeness all you like. Cincinnati scores four TDs and Chad Johnson has one catch? Carson Palmer is sacked six times, throws two interceptions and loses a fumble? Pittsburgh's Willie Parker has 123 yards in the first three quarters?

And the Bengals ... win?

In Pittsburgh? Against the reigning champions, desperate for a win after last Monday's shutout at Jacksonville?

Here's what happened you won't see on SportsCenter. Here is why, after three weeks, the Bengals are firmly on the Super Bowl short list:

All that talent and ambition has escaped adolescence. Boys to men officially debuted Sunday in Pittsburgh. Of course, Cincinnati has three more such Armageddons, at least - Pittsburgh at PBS, Baltimore home and away - but the will the Bengals need to come back clear-headed after a standing eight-count is finally in place.

Don't believe me. Listen to offensive tackle Willie Anderson: "We didn't allow the game to get too big. That's what I'm proudest of. Great teams want to unravel you. Pittsburgh unraveled us last year. Today, it went the other way. We keep plugging. The good teams do that.

"At some point, your character has to stand up. Ours did. We are tough-minded."

The irony is, the Steelers showed the Bengals how to do it. They've been Cincinnati's role model. Big brother's iron-willed run through last December and January taught the Bengals a lesson about winning that every great team earns: It really ain't over 'til it's over.

With eight minutes left in the game, Palmer was on his back for the sixth time, sacked for a 10-yard loss. Pittsburgh led 17-14 and was about to get the ball. This line was all but written:

The Bengals are still little brother, their noses pressed against the window, looking into the champions room.

Then Pittsburgh's Ricardo Colclough tried to catch a punt the way Adam Dunn catches a fly ball, with similar results. Tony Stewart recovered the muff. Palmer then hit T.J. Houshmandzadeh for nine yards and the Bengals led 21-17. Less than a minute later, safety Kevin Kaesviharn popped Pittsburgh's Verron Haynes. Brian Simmons covered the loose ball. Palmer went immediately again to Houshmandzadeh, this time for 30 yards. Two knife-in-the-throat touchdowns in less than a minute.

The Bengals led 28-17 with 7:05 left. The fat lady was warming her soprano.

(By the way: Maybe Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger is still trying to find his legs. Or maybe, his role as a very good caretaker quarterback has been undercut by the losses of Plaxico Burress, Antwan Randle El and Jerome Bettis. Whatever, he isn't Carson Palmer.)

This didn't happen by accident. It wasn't a fluke. As Anderson noted, "Seven years ago, that would have been us" unspooling at winning time.

Instead, Cincinnati will head into the bye week two weeks hence with no worse than a 3-1 record. As defensive tackle John Thornton noted, "It wasn't pretty. We don't care. We're walking out three and oh."

And, crucially, having passed a test all very good teams must pass. In the socialist NFL, where almost every team has a chance to win almost every week, a winning mindset is almost as important as making smart personnel moves. How many games are won by less than a touchdown? How much of that is confidence?

Marvin Lewis' four-year mantra - "Don't flinch" - is being read, loud and clear. That's what Sunday meant, amid the rubble of turnovers and wind and weirdness.

"They can't all be beautiful and storybook," suggested offensive guard Bobbie Williams.

Yeah, but this one was. Just not in the conventional sense.

[BengalszoneBilly]

The line that cracked me up most was this one:

Then Pittsburgh's Ricardo Colclough tried to catch a punt the way Adam Dunn catches a fly ball, with similar results.

Poor Adam Dunn. He's getting ripped on even in sporting circles outside of MLB! Classic...

[rwalling]

The line that cracked me up most was this one:

Then Pittsburgh's Ricardo Colclough tried to catch a punt the way Adam Dunn catches a fly ball, with similar results.

Poor Adam Dunn. He's getting ripped on even in sporting circles outside of MLB! Classic...

Hard to argue with the truth! And the truth is Dunn doesn't even have the hands to be a Bengals tight end!