Unsung heroes: Pendergast helped Cardinals knock off Pittsburgh

[Sandan]

1. CLANCY PENDERGAST
Defensive coordinator, Arizona Cardinals: A number of coaches in Arizona need to be mentioned. Ken Whisenhunt's plan to use two quarterbacks, Russ Grimm's offensive line and Kevin Spencer's special teams all contributed to the win in a great way, but today I want to highlight Pendergast. He was held over from the former staff and was asked to move from his 4-3 defense to the 3-4 package. Pendergast thought the two players who would benefit most from the change would be Darnell Dockett and Karlos Dansby. He was right. The two Cardinals combined for 11 tackles, three sacks and a forced fumble in Sunday's win over Pittsburgh. The defense held the league's leading rusher, Willie Parker, to 37 yards on 19 carries. It also picked off Ben Roethlisberger twice and sacked him four times. The defense was well prepared and played a huge part in one of the biggest wins for Arizona in years.

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[nurnay]

The defense looked pretty awesome. I see improvement, and I'm excited just thinking how good they could become down the road.

 

[SuperSpck]

True story. Anyone have any idea on how many times they lined up in the 4-3 vs the 3-4 this game? On the others I've had a chance to see it looked close to equal and I'm wondering if it's still the case.

 

[D-Dogg]

It was another good game by CP. He's proving to be a good move keeping him around. Denny and his staff made CP look progressively worse as time went on?