Detroit Lions 16, Pittsburgh Steelers 16
Q. It looked like maybe the deep shot kind of came in to play. Can you just explain kind of what you were playing through and why it was important for you to stay out there through it?
JARED GOFF: Yeah. On that play there, I describe it, I thought, a sprained oblique. Just kind of nagged me a little bit throughout the game.
I felt like I was fine in there and felt like it didn't affect me through the game. But it will be a little sore tomorrow, but I'll be fine.
Q. In a game where it's 50 yards through four quarters, I don't think you've experienced -- what's the --
JARED GOFF: That was part -- I mean, that was part of the plan anyways with the weather and the way that they play football and the way that we wanted to today was to run the ball efficiently and we did that. And even in situations where we typically wouldn't.
Of course as a quarterback, I want to throw the ball. But that was our game plan this week. And I don't know how many attempts we had, but it was part of the game plan. And had we have won, I'd be sitting here saying I don't want it any other way.
Q. What was the difference in the way you were communicating with Dan?
JARED GOFF: I thought he did a great job, man. It was really good. Stepping in, his first time doing it obviously. But it was really good. I thought he did a great job and had a good feel for wanting to come back to something we had done previously and kind of want to mix it up. I think it will only continue to get better from here.
Q. Have you ever pulled that oblique before?
JARED GOFF: I never have, no. It was weird.
Q. I know you've been around the game a while, but in terms of facing tough defenses, how do the Steelers' defense compare to others?
JARED GOFF: Yeah. They were tough. They were tough. They're always tough.
They've got good players at every level. And I know TJ went down today, but he's as good as anyone in the league right now. When he's healthy and they're rolling, they're as good as anyone. And the conditions like they are today, that plays in their favor sometimes.
Q. (Question regarding Dan calling plays.)
JARED GOFF: Yeah. I wouldn't say that's, like, his style. But I think he had a good feel for understanding -- you know, being on the field and feeling the weather and knowing where we're at and how good our defense was playing and being able to -- I mean, the way the weather was, we had to keep the ball on the ground in some certain situations. I thought he had a feel for that.
Q. He said sort of compared this to the twilight zone. Right? You want to win. It's a tie. Don't quite know how to feel.
JARED GOFF: I don't know how to feel either. I think it's my first tie, if I'm remembering correctly. Feels better than a loss but still not where we need to be.
You know, it's -- it's a step in the right direction. And it's encouraging the way we fought and some of the plays that we were able to make on offense.
We just felt like offensively, good, bad, or ugly, we were doing things the right way and our O line was -- we were leaning on them.
Q. Does any pressure come off of you guys? (Question about 0-17,)
JARED GOFF: No. We didn't care. That was you guys. We didn't care.
Q. I just asked Dan this too. But he said he talked with you a few times on the sideline about the injury. How close were you to saying I can't go or I'm not feeling well enough?
JARED GOFF: If I couldn't have thrown, I wouldn't have gone. It was -- it was -- I don't want to sit up here and say I was hurt and whatever, make excuses. But it was bothering me, but I felt I could compete and throw fine. And I felt like I did.
Q. The run game, the play action, the running game as often as you do and effectively as you do, do you find when you try to run some of those play actions, they were selling out so aggressively to the run --
JARED GOFF: Maybe so. Yeah. I don't know. I think -- it's a rhythm, right? It's a rhythm of the game. I think had we had exactly the conditions we had wanted and everything was perfect, I'm sure we would have mixed in a lot more play action and the rhythm would have kind of settled in a little more.
I don't know to answer your question honestly why that would happen. I think their defensive pass rush was pretty good.
Q. Do you think besides your injury, the weather dramatically altered the amount of time you guys threw?
JARED GOFF: Absolutely. I would say it was much more weather than anything to do with me. I felt like I was capable -- you know, hurt, but it was -- it wasn't a hindrance.
Q. Can you describe the -- we're up in the press box. We see the rain. But what's it like playing in that?
JARED GOFF: Yeah. It was just raining. It was just a rainy game. I think unfortunately the field conditions were what they were too.
And I know you guys can't tell from up there, but it's dirt, sand, it's -- they played a game here Thursday night. Sometimes it's the way it goes.
They had weather Thursday night when they played on it. We had weather now when we played on it. It gets sloppy, wet, and muddy. I think that can affect footing, it can affect the ball, it can affect a lot of things. But at the same time, they were playing in it too. And, ultimately, we came up just short.
Q. What can you take from this just momentum and carry over into the next week?
JARED GOFF: Like I said, I think it's encouraging the way we fought and the way we were responsive. And I thought our O line played really well.
I thought our run game, obviously, was tremendous. It just felt like at least offensively we were -- like I said, everything we were doing was for a reason. And it was really -- you know, it felt purposeful. Right?
It felt like we were really on top of what we were doing offensively and, you know, something we can build on.
Q. What went into the strategy this week of making this kind of a run first offense knowing that the Steelers don't allow too many hundred yard rushers? Just the weather or something else you guys saw?
JARED GOFF: You know, probably -- yeah, the weather is part of it. And then I think we wanted to kind of play their game a little bit.
We knew that what they do over there with 22 and their offense is pretty good. And we wanted to win the game that way, win it at the end type of thing. And had our chances. Unfortunately came up too short.
Q. You stayed even keeled in your position for the first 60 minutes of this game and felt fairly standard football game. At overtime was chaotic. The emotional ups and downs of that overtime, how tough was it to stay poised compared to --
JARED GOFF: It was hard. But I think that whole game was kind of weird. The whole flow of the game kind of put us in that situation where we were kind of -- we don't get exactly what we want.
It wasn't -- we were confident in our defense. And we were confident in the things we were doing on offense. We were doing some play action there at the end. And in the OT where we hit across the field. We had some stuff we were feeling good about. But it was kind of weird the whole day and we were feeling that.
Q. When you guys were in the locker room afterwards, were guys saying that out loud, like, God, that was a crazy one? That was weird? What was really, like, the general mood?
JARED GOFF: Yeah. I think that's it exactly. It's just weird. I've never experienced a tie. You don't know whether to be happy or sad.
I mean, really, you're not happy because we could have won it and we didn't. But it is better than a loss, I guess, you know. It's not -- that's not any consolation. But on paper, it is. And it feels that we are inching closer to where we want to be and be in positions to win games like that.
Q. That's the first time you've tied in your career?
JARED GOFF: As far as I can remember. Yeah.
DraftScripts by ASAP Sports
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports