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Amon-Ra St. Brown Penalty Negates Lions' Bonkers Game-Winning Touchdown vs. Steelers

An utterly insane ending to Steelers-Lions.

Ryan Phillips

Referee Carl Cheffers calls offensive pass interference on Detroit Lions wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown.
Referee Carl Cheffers calls offensive pass interference on Detroit Lions wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown. / Via CBS
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The Lions were this close to a miraculous win, but a late penalty robbed them of that result.

On Sunday, a controversial call negated what would have been a crazy game-winning touchdown for Detroit to beat the Steelers.

With eight seconds remaining in the game, the Lions trailed Pittsburgh 29–24 and faced fourth-and-goal on the 9-yard line. Jared Goff took the snap, dropped back, and fired a strike to Amon-Ra St. Brown near the goal line. He didn’t make it across, though, as he was quickly held up by two Steelers defenders. He made an incredibly smart play and lateraled the ball back to Goff, who dove across the line for a touchdown.

It was a brilliant play, and it appeared Detroit had won the game as the clock had expired. Not so fast. There were flags on the field.

Video is below.

The play was ruled a touchdown, but St. Brown was hit with an offensive pass interference penalty, which negated the play. That ended the game as there was no time left on the clock. The Steelers won 29–24.

That was the second touchdown on the drive that was wiped out due to a penalty. Five plays earlier, St. Brown caught a 1-yard touchdown from Goff, but it was called back due to pass interference on Isaac TeSlaa for a pick play.

That’s just a brutal way to lose a game. The defeat dropped the Lions to 8–7, and put them even closer to elimination from the playoffs, a year after they went 15–2 and earned the No. 1 seed in the NFC. After Sunday’s loss, Detroit now has a 6% chance of making the playoffs, per NFL.com.

Thanks to the crazy victory the Steelers are now 9–6.

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Ryan Phillips
RYAN PHILLIPS

Ryan Phillips is a senior writer on the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. He has worked in digital media since 2009, spending eight years at The Big Lead before joining SI in 2024. Phillips also co-hosts The Assembly Call Podcast about Indiana Hoosiers basketball and previously worked at Bleacher Report. He is a proud San Diego native and a graduate of Indiana University’s journalism program.

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