Go back to the 1976 season. The Steelers won nine games in a row — five by shutout — and rolled into the playoffs looking for their third consecutive Super Bowl championship. They destroyed the Baltimore Colts, 40-14, but lost 1,000-yard rushers Franco Harris and Rocky Bleier to injury. They lost the next week in the AFC championship game to the Oakland Raiders, 24-7, with a team that many believed was potentially the franchise’s best of the 1970s.
Has there been a Steelers playoff win and subsequent celebration that caused more angst since then than the 30-12 win Sunday against the Miami Dolphins?