6 carries, 8 yards rushing. 16 of 34, 177-yards passing, 1 TD, a QB rating of 72.8 that was the lowest of his career. And one offensive pass interference penalty as a wide receiver.

Washington Redskins QB Robert Griffin III's stat lines against the Pittsburgh Steelers weren't pretty. He was hurt by arguably 10 dropped passes from his receivers. He wasn't given the opportunity to run as much by his offensive playcallers. But ultimately, in the Steelers 27-12 victory, Dick Lebeau's Pittsburgh defense got the better of the weekend's showdown between rookie QB and rookie QB tamers.

According to various members of the Pittsburgh 'D,' it was all about physicality and discipline.

"From the beginning of the week, all we talked about was running to hit all game," said safety Will Allen. "That's all we wanted to do, run and hit. We knew if we run and hit we could make them quit."

"We hit them a little bit early [in the game]," continued Allen. We got physical at the line of scrimmage. Maybe a ball was thrown behind them, maybe they were looking around to getting hit because our linebackers were hitting them pretty good when they did catch the ball. And it was raining, too, so that played in our favor. I'm glad they did drop a few, I'm glad we got a few pass break-ups as well."

Naturally, linebacker James Harrison agreed with that sentiment.

"Some [of the drops] may have been rain, but you can look and see when a guy's trying to catch a ball and gets his head around to see who's there. Guys are flying around, going to the ball and hitting people, you're going to have that."

Fellow linebacker Larry Foote added that the squad's job commitment was sound.

"The coaches did a good job, we repped it a billion times," said Foote. "We were going home, studying film. We came out with a 'W.' I'm quite sure our eyes, if we can control that I don't care if it was a throw-back, flea flicker, everybody has to know their assignment. Your eyes can be your best friend, and they can also be your worst enemy."

Griffin's longest run of the day was for seven-yards, with LB LaMarr Woodley getting enough of his back on the chase to push him out of bounds. On another RGIII run, inside the five-yard line, Keenan Lewis and Ziggy Hood combined to contain the rookie phenom and sandwich him to the ground.

"Guys up front contained the pocket," said Foote. "We didn't get up field and let him gash us. They did a good job. I don't really know yet until I see the film, but he wasn't running all over the place. The front seven got challenged by Mike T. all week and they delivered. The Steelers, we're going to run and hit. They know that, the quarterbacks know that. That might be an advantage for us, deter him from running. Our safeties are going to hit, our DBs are going to hit, and you don't see that in a lot of defenses around the league."

"You've got to read you keys, because they can pass out of the read-option as well," said Allen, who was credited with 5 tackles and 3 pass break-ups. "They can run, pass, half-back pass, whatever they want. They did so many gimmick plays, you have to be on your keys. I primarily had the pitch, so if they pitch the ball out to the running back the linebackers are taking care of the interior runs. That was the gameplan, but you never know he can fake the pitch and drop back to pass. We saw some double reverse passes, throwbacks and things like that. Our corners played well today, they were disciplined and locked down with their eyes. And we got a lot of pressure up front which helped us win."

All told for the Pittburgh defense, that's three straight weeks that they're held the opposing QB to a sub-80 QB rating.

"I don't think we're dominant yet," said Harrison. "Not right now. We're getting back to where we can play better than we have been. We've still got a lot of room to go to improve. Just time, getting out there and putting together a better 60 minutes than the previous week."

"We're coming together," said Foote. "We still have that 'chip', though. That big 3 is still there [in the loss column] and [blown] fourth quarter leads. But this is our story, we're writing it. What a big challenge next week to go against the world champs in their house. One of the best quarterbacks in the league. They're got a great running game, great receivers. We're going to test ourselves next week."