The defending AFC champion Pittsburgh Steelers head into the playoffs with Ben Roethlisberger nursing a severely sprained left ankle and Rashard Mendenhall out with a torn ACL.

They still might be in better shape than the Denver Broncos , who are also dealing with injuries to key offensive personnel and have been struggling mightily behind Tim Tebow .

Making matters worse for the AFC West champs, they also have to contend with the league's best defense.

With the Steelers' offense banged up, their defense looks to frustrate Tebow and the Broncos, who back into Sunday's wild-card game in Denver on the heels of three straight losses.

Pittsburgh (12-4) lost Mendenhall, the team's top rusher, late in the first quarter of last Sunday's 13-9 win over Cleveland. The injury to his right knee leaves third-year running back Isaac Redman and rookie John Clay as the only healthy ball carriers on the roster.

Redman ran for 92 yards and a touchdown on 19 carries against the Browns, but also lost two fumbles.

"Now that we've got (the fumbles) out of the way, we tell him 'You're the feature guy, you need to prepare for it,'" tackle Max Starks said.

Pittsburgh would benefit greatly if Redman can make some plays to take the pressure off Roethlisberger, who hasn't been as effective since injuring his ankle against Cleveland on Dec. 8. He re-aggravated the injury in the regular-season finale after sitting out the previous week, and said Wednesday his ankle felt like a "five" on a scale of one-to-10.

While Roethlisberger expects to play, his protection might not be as good as hoped with starting center Maurkice Pouncey likely to sit out due to a sprained ankle.

In the two games he's played since initially hurting his ankle, Roethlisberger has thrown for 551 yards with no touchdowns and three interceptions for a 62.2 quarterback rating. In his first 13 contests, he had 21 TDs to 11 picks, averaging 1.66 more yards per attempt, for a 95.6 passer rating.

While Roethlisberger hasn't been at his best lately, he's been considerably better than Tebow.

After being the talk of the NFL while engineering amazing comebacks during Denver's six-game winning streak, Tebow has seemingly lost his magic as his team hasn't won since. He has four interceptions and two fumbles in the last two games, and is coming off a brutal performance in last Sunday's 7-3 loss to Kansas City, misfiring on 16 of 22 passes and throwing for 60 yards with a pick for a 20.6 QB rating.

The Broncos (8-8) still managed to win the division thanks to Oakland's loss.

"I think that he's probably going through what a lot of newly starting quarterbacks go through in that you get enough looks on people on film, then you get ideas about comfort zone and things about how you can potentially play him," Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said. "I think people are gathering more information about him."

Despite sputtering into the playoffs, Tebow isn't concerning himself with what happened in the final weeks of the regular season.

"The three losses haven't shaken my confidence," said Tebow, who has completed 41.1 percent of his passes and is averaging 146.3 passing yards during the skid.

Now he's got the difficult task of facing a Pittsburgh team that is first in total defense (271.8 yards per game), passing defense (171.9) and points allowed (14.2).

The Steelers, who have allowed a league-low three touchdowns in six games since Week 12, will be welcoming back linebacker LaMarr Woodley , who spent the second half of the season dealing with a strained left hamstring.

They won't have safety Ryan Clark available, though, because of a sickle-cell trait that becomes aggravated when playing at higher elevations. Clark also didn't play in the Steelers' last game in Denver, a 28-10 win in 2009 in which Roethlisberger threw for 233 yards with three TDs.

Ryan Mundy will make his third career start in Clark's place.

Going up against Pittsburgh's stout defense, John Fox and the Broncos' offensive staff are likely to be even more cautious to prevent Tebow from making more mistakes.

"We have to put him in position where he can succeed," Fox said. "We'll try to give him some better pass plays to operate."

Denver's offense revolved around a ground game that led the league in rushing and set the franchise single-season mark with 2,632 yards. Willis McGahee ran for 1,199 of those and Tebow finished with 660 on the ground, but continuing that pace could be tough because of a couple injuries.

Right guard Chris Kuper , the leader of a young line, broke his left leg against the Chiefs and is done for the season, while fullback Spencer Larsen might miss the game with a sprained MCL in his left knee. On the other side of the ball, safety Brian Dawkins has been ruled out due to a neck injury.

Although the odds seem to be stacked against Tebow, Roethlisberger and the Steelers know what the unorthodox quarterback is capable of.

"I think he's a winner. I think he finds ways to get it done," said Roethlisberger, who has nine TD passes and a 115.8 passer rating in three games in Denver. "People say he can't throw the ball, he can't do this. He finds a way to win."

Roethlisberger should know. The two-time Super Bowl champion is 10-3 all-time in the playoffs - the third-best record of any QB with at least 10 postseason starts since 1950 - and has won seven consecutive games in January.

One of those playoff victories came over the Broncos in the 2006 AFC championship, Denver's last playoff appearance.

These teams have split their six playoff meetings, with the winner advancing to the Super Bowl five times.

Tebow rules in OT, too: Broncos 29, Steelers 23

DENVER (AP) -- "Pull the trigger," John Elway told his Denver Broncos star, Tim Tebow , trying to shake the quarterback from a three-game funk.

Tebow went one better - he pulled off an upset.

A rejuvenated Tebow connected with Demaryius Thomas on an electrifying 80-yard touchdown pass on the first play of overtime and the Broncos defeated the stunned Pittsburgh Steelers 29-23 in the AFC wild-card game on Sunday.

Wild doesn't begin to describe it. The play took 11 seconds and was the quickest ending to an overtime in NFL history. It was also the longest overtime touchdown in playoff history.

Thomas hauled in a high play-action pass at the Denver 38, stiff-armed Ike Taylor and then outraced backup safety Ryan Mundy to the end zone.

"I was just saying, `Man trust your speed. Trust your speed. Don't cut back. Don't cut back.' And he kept it straight. He outran the guy," said Willis McGahee , whose fourth-quarter fumble helped Pittsburgh tie it.

"I was like, `Oh my God, is he still running?' Please just go. Please. Please."

Tebow, who had done next to nothing in the second half after a 20-point explosion in the second quarter, looked as startled as everyone else. He chased down Thomas and knelt on one knee - Tebowing as it's known - in the end zone while the crowd was going crazy. Then he pounded a fist in triumph and took a victory lap.

"When I saw him scoring, first of all, I just thought, `Thank you, Lord,"' Tebow said. "Then, I was running pretty fast, chasing him - like I can catch up to D.T! Then I just jumped into the stands, first time I've done that. That was fun. Then, got on a knee and thanked the Lord again and tried to celebrate with my teammates and the fans."

Behind Tebow's season-high 316 yards passing, the Broncos (9-8) are heading to New England for a second-round game against the top-seeded Patriots (13-3) on Saturday night.

The Patriots walloped the Broncos 41-23 last month, sending Tebow into a funk that included seven turnovers and a 40 percent completion clip - and prompting Elway to implore him to "pull the trigger" in the playoffs.

Did he ever.

And unlike Elway, who lost his first postseason start - to the Steelers at home in 1984 - Tebow is 1-0 in the playoffs.

"We're just a fighting team. A lot of resilience," cornerback Champ Bailey said. "In any adverse situation, we'll find a way to get out of it. Everybody says we backed into the playoffs, we're in. We did something right along the way. We're in it. We won a game. Now, we've got to go try to win another one."

The Steelers (12-5) lost despite Ben Roethlisberger rallying injury-depleted Pittsburgh from a two-touchdown halftime deficit with 10 points in the final 10 minutes.

Pittsburgh called tails for the overtime coin toss, and it came up heads.

Tebow, who engineered five fourth-quarter comebacks and three OT wins in the regular season, wasted no time finding Thomas over the middle with just his second pass on first down all night - and his first completion.

Thomas also had receptions of 51 and 58 yards to set up second-quarter touchdowns after Tebow lost his top target, Eric Decker , to a seriously injured left knee, in the first half.

"They were the No. 1 defense and we are the No. 1 offense running the ball," Thomas said. "So, I feel like they wanted to make a statement and stop the run. I don't know if they forgot about the passing game. The last couple of games that we had, we were not passing the ball that great."

Thus, Elway's admonition.

"I feel like he came out and played confident," Eddie Royal said. "And I think that's what John was trying to tell him: Play the way you know how to play. And Tim did that. He was smart with the ball and really led this offense today."

Tebow's passer rating of 125.6 was the highest in Broncos postseason history.

"He showed he's a quarterback in the NFL, case closed," McGahee said. "They say he couldn't throw. They said we wouldn't be able to run the ball on them. We did that. I wonder what they're going to say next week."

Mundy was playing in place of Ryan Clark , the Steelers' leading tackler who sat this one out because of a blood condition that's exacerbated at altitude.

"We lost, and it's not because I didn't play; we had very capable guys that played well," said Clark, who was one of several Steelers sidelined or injured. Pro Bowl center Maurkice Pouncey was out, replaced by Doug Legursky , who had a bad snap right before halftime that moved Pittsburgh out of field goal range.

On the first snap of overtime, Thomas pulled in Tebow's high pass and raced down the Broncos sideline, sending the crowd, including Elway, the Broncos executive vice president, into a frenzy at Sports Authority Field, which was rocking like the old Mile High Stadium back in the 1990s.

McGahee sold the play-action well, drawing safety Troy Polamalu and others up to the line to defend the run and leaving Thomas with room on the crossing pattern to grab the pass and turn on the jets for the 80-yard score, Tebow's longest pass play as a pro.

"It was a little surprising," Steelers linebacker James Farrior said. "But I guess he's been working hard. He's taken a lot of criticism over the past few weeks about his throwing motion, his passing game. Like I said earlier, he's a competitor. You keep trying to down a guy, and a guy like him who's a tough competitor, he's going to get you one time."

Hines Ward called this defeat "just as disappointing" as last year's loss to Green Bay in the Super Bowl.

"I've been on a lot of really good teams, thank God, and I felt this team was up there with them," Polamalu said. "We weren't able to stay healthy and keep a cohesiveness like we wanted to."

Tebow completed 10 of 21 passes and Thomas hauled in four of them for 204 yards after Decker was injured on a hit by linebacker James Harrison .

Thomas, who missed training camp while recovering from a torn Achilles and the start of the season while dealing with a fractured finger, has come on strong of late, averaging 109 yards over the last six games.

But the Broncos' top pick in 2010 - taken three slots ahead of Tebow in the first round - hadn't had done anything like this.

"It's amazing because I haven't played explosive like I did in college in a long time," Thomas said.

Tebow threw two TD passes and also ran 10 times for 50 yards and a touchdown.

"I think we executed a little bit better. We tried to step up," he said. "We knew it was win or go home. This team wanted to fight. We wanted to play another game."

These two teams had played the first ever regular season overtime game on Sept. 22, 1974, in Denver. Now, they played the first non-sudden death playoff game in history. The new rules called for both teams to get the ball in the extra period providing there wasn't a touchdown by either the offense or defense.

Tebow took care of that in a hurry.

Making his first appearance in the playoffs after going 7-4 as Denver's starter, Tebow outplayed Roethlisberger, a two-time Super Bowl winner playing on a bad ankle, who fell to 10-4 in the playoffs.

Roethlisberger was 22 for 40 for 289 yards with one TD, one interception and five sacks. Tebow wasn't taken down once by the league's top defense.

The Broncos snapped a three-game losing streak that had many wondering if they were even worthy of their first playoff in six seasons, and it kept the Steelers from their 34th playoff win, which would have broken a tie with the Cowboys for the most ever.

Tebow led Denver to 20 second-quarter points - they had scored just 13 in the quarter in his 11 starts - but a 20-6 halftime lead didn't last long.

Receiver Mike Wallace had a 1-yard TD run, Shaun Suisham kicked a short field goal and Jerricho Cotchery grabbed a 31-yard TD pass with 3:48 left in regulation to tie it.

The Steelers were nearing field goal range in the final minute of regulation but the Broncos sacked Roethlisberger three times on that final drive, forcing a fumble that Roethlisberger recovered.

"We were moving it and we had a shot," Roethlisberger said. "Someone got, it felt like a finger, on the ball and knocked it out. After that, you're trying to throw a 70-yard Hail Mary and that's hard."

Roethlisberger never got the ball back as Tebow added to his growing list of impossible victories in the blink of an eye and a flick of the wrist.

"He gets a lot of flak when things go wrong," Clark said, "but he played phenomenal today."

Notes: This was the Broncos' second playoff win since Elway retired following his second straight Super Bowl triumph in 1999, and their first since Jan. 14, 2006, when they handed Tom Brady his first playoff loss. The Broncos lost to the Steelers the following week. ... This was the first OT playoff game since the Saints beat the Vikings 31-28 in the NFC championship on Jan. 24, 2010.

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