A Comprehensive Guide To Every Steelers Opening Game In The Mike Tomlin Era

The schedules are out, and the 2023-2024 Pittsburgh Steelers now have a season opener to plan for. It will be a one o’clock game against the San Francisco 49ers. It is the first home opener for Pittsburgh since 2014 and there is no doubt it will be highly anticipated by fans, but how well do the Steelers tend to do in home openers? Here is a brief history of every opening game in the Mike Tomlin era. Be sure to click on each year for the highlights of the games. 

2007: Tomlin began his career by watching his team destroy the Cleveland Browns 34-7 at Cleveland Browns Stadium. Both teams started the season with brand new head coaches, Tomlin with the Steelers and Romeo Crennel with the Browns. This game was a pretty good indicator of how both those careers would go.

2008: The year the Steelers would win the Super Bowl over the Arizona Cardinals. The season for the team began with a bang, handily defeating the Houston Texans 34-17 at Heinz Field. This game in particular heavily relied on Willie Parker who would score three touchdowns and rushed for 138 yards. This game would be a shining example of all the strengths that led to the eventual Super Bowl win.

2009: Back-to-back home openers? Feels like a different era. A low-scoring game, the defending Super Bowl champs would eek out a nailbiter over the Tennessee Titans, with an overtime field goal by Jeff Reed to put the Steelers over, 13-10.

2010: A threepeat of home openers! The Steelers would kickoff at Heinz Field with another overtime win, this time over the Atlanta Falcons. A game of field goals,  Rashard Mendenhall would score the lone touchdown, a 50-yard break away in overtime to seal the win. 15-9. A clutch performance from a running back who unfortunately didn't always come through. The Steelers made it to the Super Bowl that year and lost, in part due to, but not because, of a Mendenhall fumble. 

The Steelers Slump

2011: The streak had to end at some point. This season began with the first opening Steelers loss in the Tomlin era. Ben Roethlisberger would throw three picks in a big loss to the Baltimore Ravens 35-7 at M&T Bank Stadium. A sign of things to come in a very up and down year that ended in the infamous overtime loss to a Tim Tebow-led Denver Broncos team. 

2012: The Steelers had their chance at redemption over the Broncos but instead lost to a Peyton Manning-led Denver team, 31- 19, at Mile High Stadium.

2013: The game started out strong with Darius Reynaud going down in his own end zone for a safety, putting the Steelers up 2-0. That was about all that went right as the Steelers eventually lost 16-9 to the Mike Munchak coached Tennessee Titans at Heinz Field. There are really no highlights to this game, even the safety was unearned and unexciting. This video sums it up best.

2014: Do you remember Mike Pettine? Neither do I. He was another in the long line of Browns head coaches that had to spend their short-lived careers getting beat by the Steelers. They put up a good fight though. As the Steelers held off a late game comeback, the game rested on the leg of Shaun Suisham with 40 seconds left. He would score and the Steelers would win, 30-27, in front of their home field crowd. The last home opener for nearly a decade.

The Away Game Stretch

2015: The Steelers went into Gillette Stadium and got absolutely destroyed by Rob Gronkowski. He would score three red zone touchdowns as the New England Patriots defeated the Steelers 28-21. The Steelers would continue the season plagued with injuries and an up and down pass defense, limping their way to a Divisional Round playoff loss to, once again, the Broncos.

2016: The Steelers offense would dominate this game with 300 yards passing from Roethlisberger's arm and 146 yards off of DeAngelo Williams legs. They would defeat the now Washington Commanders 38-16 at FedEx Field. A sign of things to come, this Steelers offense would lead the way to  a great season that ended in a heartbreaking loss in the AFC Championship to the Patriots.

2017: This was supposed to be the year. The aging, but still strong, Steelers would begin the highly anticipated season in a grind it out win over the Hue Jackson-led Browns, 21-18 in FirstEnergy Stadium. The team won by capitalizing on mistakes with an interception from TJ Watt and a blocked punt recovery by Anthony Chickillo. A highly explosive team, the 2017 Steelers were thought of by many to be the best in the league, unfortunately this game would show a trend. They continued to play down to opponents, ultimately losing to the Jacksonville Jaguars 45-42 in the Divisional Round.

2018: The lone opening game tie in Tomlin's career happened between the Steelers and Browns at FirstEnergy Stadium with a final score of 21-21. The game came down to multiple mistakes and missed/blocked field goals by both teams and resulted in a tie that would hover over the Steelers all season long, ultimately keeping them out of the playoffs.

2019: A nightmare season. The Steelers would play one game with Roethlisberger and they spent it getting demolished by the Patriots, 33-3, on primetime at Gillette Stadium. It was a game where nothing went right for the team. Roethlisberger would go on to get injured the next game and leave the car keys to the offense in the hands of Mason Rudolph & Duck Hodges in a wild 8-8 season. At least, 2019 gave the Steelers Minkah Fitzpatrick in a trade with the Miami Dolphins.

2020: The Steelers would open the season at MetLife Stadium with a three-touchdown performance by Roethlisberger in his first game back. It was a respectable 26-10 win over the New York Giants. The Steelers would continue to win 10 more games straight through the “Covid Season” before losing four of their last five games and losing to the Browns in the playoffs. The team, which once had so much promise, was plagued with injuries and teams becoming accustomed to Randy Fichtner’s quick-draw passing offense.

2021: To many fans surprise, Roethlisberger came back for one more season and he started by leading this scrappy underdog team to a win over the “Super Bowl Favorite” Buffalo Bills. The Steelers would walk out with a win of 23-16 at Highmark Stadium. The rest is history as the team would struggle and fight its way into the playoffs at the end of the season after giving Roethlisberger his famed lap around the stadium.

2022: The Steelers and Tomlin’s first year without Roethlisberger began with Mitch Trubisky starting over first-round draft pick, Kenny Pickett. Tomlin would once again show his opening day preparedness by coaching another underdog team to a wild overtime win. A win that can be credited to an amazing defensive performance and the toe of Chris Boswell as the Steelers went over the defending AFC Champions, the Cincinnati Bengals, at Paycor Stadium, 23-20. 

Ultimately, the Steelers ended up as the odd men out, missing the playoffs with nine wins and eight losses, but Tomlin proved that even in a rebuilding year the team was no slouch as Pickett came into his own eventually taking over and leading the team to multiple late game wins at the end of the year.

2023: This leads us to the new season. The Steelers begin with the 49ers at Acrisure Stadium, and their first home game in nearly a decade won’t be an easy matchup. If Brock Purdy can play, it will be a matchup of the two most successful quarterbacks of their draft class, (the first and last quarterbacks drafted, respectively). If Purdy is unable to play, it could be Trey Lance or Sam Darnold suiting up in Pittsburgh. Neither player has shown much to be fearful of and that may just be enough to give the team the edge it needs to defeat the stout 49ers roster.

The Statistics

A lot can happen between opening day and now, but if you are looking to remain on the optimistic side, here are the statistics: At this point Tomlin is 4-1 at home and 6-4-1 Away, leading to an overall record of 10-5-1 in opening day games. That puts the Steelers at a 65.63% winning percentage in opening day games. Most would say that is something to be pretty optimistic about. 

So what do you think #SteelersNation? Will the 2023 Pittsburgh Steelers start off with a win at home? Or do you think this will be unable to compete against the 49ers stellar roster? Let us know in the comments below!