/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/39058142/20140821_ajw_se7_316.JPG.0.jpg)
For a second-straight season, the Steelers' defense has failed to record a turnover in its first two regular-season games. Last season, it took until the fifth game to record their first turnover which, ironically, was the first game they won in 2013.
Though the team is 1-1 going into Week 3, the defense knows it needs to create turnovers if the Steelers expect to have a winning record by the quarter-season mark after Week 4.
Though the team has struggled so far, defensive coordinator, Dick LeBeau thinks all that can change soon.
"I think we can turn the football over," he said, according to Alan Robinson of TribLive Sports. "You have to get people in longer yardage situations a lot of the time to get those turnovers."
That's almost verbatim with what rookie linebacker, Ryan Shazier, said in the locker room after the team's loss to the Baltimore Ravens last week.
"When we're giving them third-and-twos, second-and-twos, second-and-fours, the odds of them getting first downs are a lot higher," Shazier said in Baltimore last week. "We just have to do a better job at stopping them on first down so we can force more third-and-longs."
It seems the message LeBeau is speaking publicly is the same one reverberating inside the locker room, even with the Steelers' rookies. As the season goes on, look for more-aggressive plays on the early downs of opponents' drives to see if the Steelers are able to prevent larger gains and force offenses to convert longer third downs.