Not that I think it necessarily favors either team, but the weather is going to be super cold on Sunday. High temp: 18 degrees Low temp: 8 degrees Likely to be 15 or lower at kickoff. One good thing is that there isn't expected to be much wind or any precipitation. Glad I'll be watching on TV.
The more hits we put on Ben the more they start hurting. Sanchez will not be touched, a fat Hawaiian guy told me.
Not another Ice Bowl, I hope. 1975 AFC Championship Pittsburgh 16, Oakland 10 Known as the "Ice Bowl," the game was played in extremely adverse weather conditions. Wind, snow flurries and 16-degree temperatures made the contest a brutally hard-hitting defensive struggle. Second-year middle linebacker Jack Lambert recovered three fumbles, including two in the fourth quarter that led to the Steelers' two touchdowns - a 25-yard run by Franco Harris and a 20-yard TD reception by John Stallworth. With the 16-10 win, the Steelers advanced to Super Bowl X, where they won their second consecutive NFL title. The game was not decided until the final play, and the Steelers overcame eight turnovers, including a lost on-side kick, which gave the Raiders a final opportunity to win. The Raiders defense set the tone early in the game and intercepted two passes in the first quarter. But, the Steelers' defense was unyielding, and the best the Raiders could produce from them was a missed 38-yard field-goal attempt. The Steelers took advantage of the initial Raider turnover, the first of Mike Wagner's two interceptions and a 20-yard return, to get on the board with a field goal. In the third quarter, the Steelers missed two field goal attempts in the third quarter, 44- and 48-yard tries, and the Raiders committed three turnovers to the Steelers' one. Harris completed a 70-yard drive when he found the middle jammed and swung around his left side for 25 yards and the game's first TD on the second play of the final quarter. Raiders' quarterback Ken Stabler responded with a 60-yard, six-pass drive to reduce the Steelers' lead to three again. Another Oakland fumble, which Jack Lambert grabbed for his third recovery of the game on the Oakland 25-yard line, set up the Steelers' final score. While the Steelers were running out the clock, Harris fumbled and the Raiders quickly moved into position for a 41-yard field goal. The Steelers committed their third fumble in the last five minutes of the game on the ensuing onside kickoff but time ran out on the Raiders. http://www.steelers.com/history/three-rivers/1st-great-game-and-play.html
As I said in another, less specific, thread, the weather here is very strange. It was in the low 40s on Monday - and nearly a foot of accumulated snow on my car was gone today. It's been getting colder, but I don't think overnight lows have hit single digits yet this week. The weather reports have been wrong here in the past six months than they are in many cities (like New York, not, say, San Diego) over a few years. It's often tough to tell without an exact measurement how cold it is here because the municipality does a really great job deicing the streets. In terms of the field, since it hasn't been brutally cold for a week leading up to the game, I think it's unlikely that this will be another Ice Bowl. It's also predicted to be partly cloudy on Sunday during the day, which in Pittsburgh speak means sunny. But, as I said, the weather forecast can be horribly inaccurate here. I think it could be anywhere from 0-35 on Sunday night (ignoring wind chill), but I believe the wind is going to be a bigger concern imho - let's hope it's calm, for Nick Folk's sake. Pittsburgh delenda est.
I did a meteorologist apprentice program at the Carnegie Science Center in High school. They said Pittsburgh is the 2nd hardest city to forecast weather for because of the Lake effect weather off Lake Erie. Cleveland is the hardest. We never know what we're going to get.
