Colts trail Steelers 21-7 at halftime on Thanksgiving night

At halftime of tonight’s game the Pittsburgh Steelers lead the Indianapolis Colts 21-7, which is probably what many expected.

The Steelers were clearly the much better team in the first half and were doing pretty much whatever they wanted offensively. Le’Veon Bell rushed for 73 yards and a touchdown, while Ben Roethlisberger and Antonio Brown connected for two scores in the first half. That’s now seven touchdowns in Brown’s last two and a half games against the Colts, which is pretty good.

For the Colts offensively it was an up and down half. It wasn’t particularly pretty and wasn’t great, but they did manage to move the ball some - thanks in part to their special teams, especially Pat McAfee’s 35-yard pass on a fake punt that set up the team’s only score so far. It was a half of missed opportunities for the Colts, the most prominent of which came at the end of the first half when the team had first and goal from the two yard line. After an insane catch by T.Y. Hilton on a play in which he was injured (after a dropped would-be touchdown earlier in the drive), the Colts proceeded to be stopped on four straight plays at the goal line. They had a chance to enter halftime down just seven (somehow!) but couldn’t do it.

Ultimately, outside of McAfee’s fake punt, this game has gone about how you should have expected it to go without Andrew Luck. The Steelers are putting up points and doing well against the Colts’ defense, but the Colts’ offense hasn’t been able to keep up with the scoring of their own to match it. For that to start in the second half, they’ll need to play better defense and will need to take advantage of some of the opportunities (perhaps set up by the special teams units) to put up some points.

Whatever happens, consider this your open thread for the second half.