Mike Tomlin believes in ‘football justice.’ The Steelers have been served a cold dose of it.

Pittsburgh (AP) Mike Tomlin will sometimes discuss the concept of “football justice,” which is the conviction that teams and players who work hard and persevere will ultimately be rewarded.

For Tomlin and the rest of the Pittsburgh Steelers, a different form of “football justice” appears to have arrived during the past week; a sort of karmic leveling that has completely turned the once-promising season around.

Just a day after suffering a crushing defeat at home to two-win Arizona, the Steelers lost 21–18 to New England, a dismal and uninspired performance that knocked them out of first place in the AFC wild-card race and left them frantically trying to figure out how things went so wrong so quickly.

It’s impossible to hide this, defensive tackle Cam Heyward stated. “We must take responsibility for these two unpleasant games that we have played.”

Pittsburgh got into the running for the AFC North title by starting the season 6-0 in games decided by eight points or fewer. These victories came against AFC North rivals Cleveland and Baltimore, where the Steelers were outgained and outplayed but managed to stay in the game largely because of T.J. Watt’s performance and some odd coaching choices made by the guys on the other sideline.

It turns out that this kind of play is not sustainable and is risky.

Over the past month, most of the breaks, calls, and self-inflicted wounds by the opponents have disappeared.

On Thursday night, Mitch Trubisky’s throw into triple coverage in the first quarter, which gave up a touchdown for New England, was the momentum-swaying turnover made by the Steelers.

The Steelers made two poor decisions on fourth down in the second half, one of which was a pass from Trubisky to Jaylen Warren on a fourth-and-2 play that gained only one yard, and the other of which was a pass down the right sideline to Diontae Johnson, who was well covered, right before the two-minute warning that was unsuccessful.