Welcome home, Aaron Glenn.
Now, enjoy this crushing loss in your first game as the Jets’ new head coach.
If Glenn needed any reminders of this franchise’s tortured history, he was given a fresh memory on Sunday afternoon.
Aaron Rodgers threw four touchdown passes in his return to MetLife Stadium, and Chris Boswell’s 60-yard field goal with 1:03 was the difference in the heartbreaking 34-32 Jets loss to the Steelers.
The Jets blew a pair of nine-point leads and wasted a terrific day from Justin Fields (218 yards passing, three touchdowns) in his Gang Green debut. Still, he came up short late.
The Jets managed just 12 yards in their final two possessions. One with a chance to run out the clock, and the other to get into field goal position.
Rodgers, released by Glenn and the Jets, had a fantastic day. He shredded the Jets’ defense for 244 yards and four scores.
In the span of 50 seconds early in the fourth quarter, the Steelers reeled off 14 points, aided by a Xavier Gipson fumble on a kickoff return. Both drives ended with Rodgers touchdown passes.
Fields came right back, though, leading the Jets on a 12-play, 67-yard drive that he capped with a 1-yard keeper on 4th-and-goal to reclaim the lead. There was still 7:01 remaining, an eternity for Rodgers.
The first half was as unpredictable as it was shocking.
The defense couldn’t get a stop and the offense couldn’t be stopped. The Jets scored on their first four possessions — the first time they hadn’t punted in the first half of an opener since at least 1991 — but they were also gashed for 151 yards through the air by Rodgers. The secondary was a mess, giving up several chunk plays. The offense, however, piled 240 yards of offense. Fields completed 9-of-11 passes for 134 yards, highlighted by a 33-yard scoring strike to Garrett Wilson.
On their first possession, the Jets went 48 yards in 10 plays, and settled for a 35-yard Nick Folk field goal.
The Steelers responded with a touchdown, aided by a Tony Adams blown tackle that extended the drive. Gang Green answered with Fields’ touchdown pass to Wilson.
The lone negative from an offensive standpoint was the Jets settled for two field goals. Otherwise, it couldn’t have gone better.
The defense, though it stopped the run, let Rodgers do whatever he wanted. The Steelers went into the break with momentum after his 3-yard touchdown to Jonnu Smith with 32 seconds left in the half.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
