Pittsburgh Steeler's Head Coach Mike Tomlin suspects a New England Patriot tech tampered with his sideline coaches' headsets in the first half of Thursday night's NFL game, which the Pats won 28-21.
The accusation comes days after a judge dismissed Tom Brady's suspension for the DeflateGate scandal, in which a Patriot'semployee allegedly let air out of games balls at the quarterback's request.
A blog on the steeler's website quotes Coach Tomlin saying his staff couldn't communicate with each other during the first two quarters of the game at New England's Gillette Stadium, which he suggested was a frequent problem on the Patriot's home turf.
"That's always the case," Tomlin said. Instead of hearing each other most of the time, the coaches heard the Patriot's play-by-play radio broadcast. "We were listening to the Patriots' radio broadcast for the majority of the first half on our headsets, coach to coach. I'm not indicating anything; I'm telling you what happened. We let the league officials on site handle it, is what we do."
The NFL, in a written statement Friday, blamed the problem on "a power infrastucture issue," not the Patriots' staff: "In the first quarter of tonight's game, the Pittsburgh coaches experienced interference in their headset caused by a stadium power infrastructure issue, which was exacerbated by the inclement weather. The coaches' communications equipment, including the headsets, is provided by the NFL for both clubs use on game day. Once the power issue was addressed, the equipment functioned properly with no additional issues."
Tomlin said he expects it will "eventually" be resolved to the Steelers' satisfaction.
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