Leader: Steelers' Will Howard Detailed The Heated Moment That Led Ohio State To A National Championship

The Pittsburgh Steelers don't entirely know what they will get out of rookie quarterback Will Howard during his career. He is expected to be a career backup, but there could be some upside with the former collegiate National Champion. In a confusing quarterback room for Pittsburgh, there is definitely an avenue to see exactly what the rookie can do on gameday. He just needs the opportunity to prove himself, as opposed to being ignored by the coaches during training camp and preseason. 

Howard made an appearance on Footbahlin with Ben Roethlisberger to talk about what led to the Ohio State Buckeyes' National Title run, and how leadership had to take over during a very dark time.

"It was right after that [loss to Michigan]," said Howard. "I remember Coach [Ryan] Day brought all the leaders in, the whole leadership counsel. We sat down and had a meeting. He said, 'We're going to have a players-only meeting tomorrow. I'm going to be in there, all of us, and we're going to just hash it out. Whatever you got on your mind, whatever you want to say to me.' We had guys challenging Coach Day, Coach Day challenging guys, o-linemen yelling at DBs, it was a heated meeting. It wasn't fun to be a part of, and nobody wants to be a part of that, but after that game, we had no choice but to fight back."

Numerous Buckeyes had their worst game of the year in that regular season finale against the Michigan Wolverines. That alone would make players feel sick and angry, not to mention the fact that they let their biggest rivals walk into their home and shut down their offense. Fans wanted Howard, Head Coach Ryan Day, and numerous other people out of the building immediately for that seemingly catastrophic failure. 

Of course, their story did not end there. Howard continued on with the mindset after that heated meeting.

"The thing that we all come to was that we still had a chance to make a run," said Howard. 'We're in the playoffs.' As dejected as we felt in that moment, we all said, 'We can make this right by winning a National Championship,' and that's exactly what we did, and I think it talks a lot to the leadership and the maturity of the group that we had last year... people were saying all kinds of stuff about us, and we had to shut it all out. We had three weeks to get ready for Tennessee, and we came out p*ssed off. You could just see it. You could tell from the moment we stepped on that field, I just knew that nobody was going to mess with us."

As horrible as that loss to Michigan was and as angry as the whole team was, that loss may have been the catalyst to Ohio State's dominant run for the national title. They got embarrassed on home turf as its rival tried to plant the flag at the 50-yard line. Some very tough conversations had to be made, and that's exactly what they did. 

Steelers' Brass Needs To Prepare For Howard

The Steelers have had brutal losing streaks in nearly every single season starting in 2018. The leadership needed to steer the ship in the right direction has not always been there, even with Head Coach Mike Tomlin being praised for his ability to lead. All of those seasons has resulted in playoff embarrassments, if they even made it into the postseason in that particular year.

Clearly, Howard comes from a team that doesn't put up with failure. His squad had one embarrassing loss, and that was more than enough motivation to fix all of their issues and make sure they didn't play that bad again. With everyone screaming at each other, one message was abundantly clear: that kind of gameplay is unacceptable.

If that happens while the rookie quarterback is on the roster in Pittsburgh, don't expect him to be quiet in the locker room. Even if he ends up being the third quarterback on the depth chart, he most likely will go scorched earth on everyone. Failure is not an option for him.

What do you think about Howard's uncomfortable meeting with his team, and how that led to them winning the National Championship? Let us know in the comments or on X at @Steelers_ChrisB.

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