Nov 11, 2002 By Jim Wexell For The 4 min read

PITTSBURGH – Tommy Maddox, Hines Ward and Plaxico Burress had career days and set some new records. And for their efforts? “A nothing feeling,” said Burress after his best day as a pro ended inches shy of breaking a 34-34 tie against the Atlanta Falcons.

“It was that type of day,” said Ward. “You catch a Hail Mary and land on the one.”

That finished the day for all involved. Burress gained a team-record 253 receiving yards, but needed only one more yard for the effort to be deemed a success.

“I looked up at the scoreboard one time and it was 31-17. I don’t know what happened,” Burress said after making enough big plays for his own highlight reel. Burress, though, disagreed.

“We didn’t come out on top so we didn’t make enough plays,” he said.

The tie, after holding a 17-point fourth-quarter lead, certainly dampened spirits but it can’t take away from the amazing growth of the Pittsburgh Steelers’ passing game:

– Maddox broke Bobby Layne’s 44-year-old team record of 409 yards against the Chicago Cardinals with 473 yards passing.

– Burress broke Buddy Dial’s 41-year-old team record of 235 receiving yards against the Cleveland Browns with 253 receiving yards on 9 catches.

– Ward set career highs with 11 receptions for 139 yards.

“I thought Plax and Hines just showed enormous guts all day long,” said Coach Bill Cowher. “They were getting banged up and kept coming back. I just can’t say enough.”

“Hines and Plax today showed how good they are,” said Maddox. “That’s exciting for a quarterback.”

The big day began when the roommates awoke to the sound of raindrops.

“I told Plax, ‘Well, it looks like a running day,'” Ward said. “And then we read the newspaper and they’ve got their defensive backs favored in the match-up, so Plax and I really wanted to prove ourselves.”

Their statistics weren’t compiled while coming from behind, as most passing records are. The Steelers’ passing game clicked from the start. Burress caught a 33-yard touchdown pass from Maddox in the second quarter to give the Steelers a 10-7 lead. Ward then caught a 5-yard touchdown pass later in the quarter to push the lead to 17-7.

At halftime, the Steelers had 188 yards passing, and a 62-yard touchdown pass to Burress early in the third quarter gave the Steelers a 23-14 lead. An 18-yard touchdown pass to tight end Jerame Tuman gave Maddox four touchdown passes on the day, but the fourth quarter saw the Steelers go into an offensive shell. Maddox threw only two passes prior to the Steelers’ final possession, in which Maddox threw three more passes.

“You’ve got to play the odds,” Maddox said of running the ball to burn time off the clock with the 17-point lead.

In overtime, Maddox returned to his successful passing ways, but the Hail Mary pass to Burress for 50 yards ended a yard short of the goal line.

“When you put up almost 500 yards offense, you expect to win the ballgame,” said Ward. “It’s frustrating because everybody had career days. And when everybody’s putting up career days, you expect to win the ballgame and we didn’t.”

Ward talked about the mechanics behind all of those passing yards.

“They had a safety on Plax on a lot of his skinny routes. I don’t know why,” Ward said. “They put (Ray) Buchanan on me and (Ashley Ambrose) on Terance (Mathis). When you play a lot of one-on-one, Plaxico will get some chances to go down field and Tommy capitalized.”

“They singled us all day,” Burress said. “Me and Hines kind of took that personally.

“Hines and myself, we don’t get any respect as far as being good receivers and beating one-on-one coverage. They probably sat down and looked at the tape and wondered why teams double- cover us all game. Well, I guess they found out why teams do that. But we don’t get any respect as a corps. It was a challenge to us. If you’re going to match us up one-on-one, we’re going to show you why teams do that.”

For the season, Ward has 66 catches for 746 yards and 8 touchdowns. Burress has 45 catches for 769 yards and 6 touchdowns. Maddox, who didn’t start the first three games, has completed 133 of 206 passes for 1,678 yards, 15 touchdowns and 7 interceptions.

“Everybody on this team has a lot of confidence in Tommy,” Burress said. “He’s the main reason the offense is running the way it is.”