Steelers Cash In on Reed’s Kick Six

The Pittsburgh Steelers are set at kicker for their playoff push. The quarterback position is a more interesting story.

Kordell Stewart made a bid to get his job back for good Sunday, and recently signed rookie Jeff Reed made all six of his field-goal attempts to lift the Steelers to a 25-23 victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars.

“It’s nice to have a very dependable kicker,” Steeler Coach Bill Cowher said.

Reed’s sixth field goal, a 50-yarder, gave Pittsburgh (7-4-1) a 25-17 lead with 4:30 left.

Mark Brunell and the Jaguars (5-7) answered with a 65-yard touchdown drive to cut the deficit to two with 1:16 left. But the Steelers’ defense stopped the Jaguars on the two-point try when Dewayne Washington broke up the pass Brunell threw into heavy coverage to Jimmy Smith.

The Steelers, 6-1-1 in their last eight games, expanded their lead to 1 1/2 games over Baltimore and Cleveland in the AFC North.

Stewart, who regained the starting job after Tommy Maddox’s scary injury two weeks ago, threw for 202 yards and ran for 84 more and the team’s lone touchdown.

The next decision for Cowher is who starts the next game against Houston. “I’m not going to worry about that right now,” he said.

Maddox, who has been cleared to play but entered the game only as Reed’s holder, said “you’re asking the wrong person,” when asked whether he thought he would get his job back.

Stewart also didn’t want to get involved in guessing games.

“I have no clue,” he said. “I’m not in Bill’s head.”

The kicking situation is much more concrete.

Reed, a rookie from North Carolina, was signed two weeks ago when Todd Peterson was placed on injured reserve with cracked ribs. In his pro debut last week, he made two of three field goal attempts, but missed an extra point that almost proved critical in a 29-21 victory over Cincinnati. The Bengals were driving at the end with a chance to tie.

There were no such misses this time. Reed was successful from 25, 29, 30, 46, 33 yards and then made the 50-yarder. The sixth kick tied the 14-year-old franchise record set by Gary Anderson.

Playing the second half with a broken nose, the Steelers’ Jerome Bettis ran for 86 yards to reach 11,459 for his career and pass John Riggins for 10th place on the NFL career rushing list.