The Atlanta Falcons and their new head coach, Kevin Stefanski, have a Week 1 problem they’ll be trying to shake when they open the season on the road against the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday, Sept. 13.
Atlanta hasn’t exactly made a habit of starting fast. Over the last five years, the Falcons are 1-4 in season openers, with the lone win coming in 2023, a 24-10 victory over the Carolina Panthers. That was also the final season of Arthur Smith’s run as Atlanta’s head coach.
The matchup history doesn’t offer much comfort either. The Falcons are 2-16-1 all-time against the Steelers, their worst winning percentage against any opponent in the NFL.
Stefanski arrives with his own Week 1 baggage. During his time as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, he went 2-4 in openers.
His wins came in 2022, when Cleveland edged the Carolina Panthers 26-24, and in 2023, when the Browns beat the Cincinnati Bengals 24-3. That means Stefanski’s most recent opener victory and Atlanta’s most recent opener victory both came in the same season.
Across the sideline, the Steelers are also bringing in a new voice in Mike McCarthy, and his recent opener results haven’t exactly screamed certainty. He’s 11-7 overall in Week 1 from his time with the Green Bay Packers and Dallas Cowboys.
In Dallas, McCarthy went 2-3 in openers, dropping his first three before winning his last two. But he also guided Green Bay to five straight Week 1 wins from 2007 to 2011, with Aaron Rodgers at quarterback during that stretch, the same Rodgers who helped deliver a Super Bowl to Green Bay in 2011.
There’s plenty for Atlanta to like on offense. The Falcons can lean on Bijan Robinson, Drake London, and Kyle Pitts Sr., a trio that gives the unit real punch.
And defensively, Atlanta comes in a year after setting a franchise record with 57 sacks, which gives Stefanski a path to make life uncomfortable for Rodgers, now 42 and no longer the same escape artist he once was. Rodgers is also on the brink of retirement after the season, and his top targets are DK Metcalf and Michael Pittman Jr.
But the Falcons won’t have all of their best tools available up front. Jalon Walker is out for the season with a torn ACL, and James Pearce Jr. has been suspended by the NFL for violating the league’s personal conduct policy.
Stefanski’s background in the AFC North should help Atlanta understand what it’s walking into. He spent years seeing the Steelers twice a season and even knocked them out of the 2020-2021 NFL playoffs while leading the Browns.
Still, this is not the same Pittsburgh team, and the Steelers may actually have the more complete roster. On defense, they can make things difficult no matter whether the Falcons start Michael Penix Jr. or Tua Tagovailoa. Joey Porter Jr. and Jalen Ramsey give Pittsburgh a secondary that can clamp down on the outside, while TJ Watt is set to return after dealing with a partially collapsed lung in a down 2025 NFL season that ended with only seven sacks.
That setup could push Atlanta toward the ground game, where Pittsburgh’s run defense is described as middle-of-the-pack.
So both sides enter this opener with something to prove. Atlanta and Stefanski are trying to rewrite their Week 1 script, and Pittsburgh and McCarthy are looking to flip their own recent opener narrative as the reset begins.
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