01:00 AM EST on Wednesday, January 25, 2006

To hear Mark Whipple talk, being Ben Roethlisberger's quarterback coach is like being the young Wolfgang A. Mozart's music teacher. The playbook is Roethlisberger's sheet music. You just hand it to him and let him play.

"He's a natural talent," Whipple said yesterday during a break in putting together the offensive game plan for Super Bowl XL a week from Sunday against the Seahawks in Detroit. "He gets it."

It's highly unlikely the Steelers would have gotten to their first Super Bowl in 10 years without Roethlisberger. It's also highly unlikely that Roethlisberger would have progressed as rapidly as he has without the tutelage of Whipple, who never had a losing season in four years as head coach at Brown from 1994-97, and led UMass to a national Division I-AA championship in 1998.

"We have a good relationship, one of mutual trust," Whipple said yesterday. "I know him well enough to know when to leave him alone, and when I can say something."

Roethlisberger is really something, one of those players you can't say enough good things about.

As a rookie last year, drafted in the first round out of Miami of Ohio, he was thrust into action early in the season because of an injury to Tommy Maddox. Most young quarterbacks making the jump from the Mid-American Conference to the NFL would have been in over their heads. Not the 6-foot-5, 240-pound Roethlisberger, who led the Steelers to 13 straight wins and an NFL-best 15-1 regular-season record.

Big Ben didn't taste defeat for the first time until the AFC Championship Game, when the Patriots -- whose NFL-record 21-game winning streak had been ended by Roethlisberger and the Steelers in Pittsburgh that October -- returned to the Steel City in January and put a 41-27 whuppin' on the Steelers, which left a bad taste in Roethlisberger's mouth.

Intercepted three times in that game -- including an 87-yard touchdown return by Rodney Harrison that gave New England a 24-3 lead heading into halftime -- Roethlisberger felt he had let his team down, that it was his fault the Steelers wouldn't be going to the Super Bowl.

"After that experience," he said, "I told myself I would be better prepared the next time I had a chance in the playoffs."

The Steelers didn't seem to have much chance in this year's playoffs, going in as the No. 6 seed in the AFC after finishing second in their division, behind the Bengals.

But, sparked by Roethlisberger and an aggressive defense, Pittsburgh won three in a row on the road -- at No. 3 Cincinnati, No. 1 Indianapolis and No. 2 Denver -- to earn a trip to the Super Bowl.

"We're playing well at the right time of year," Whipple said.

Roethlisberger is playing exceptionally well, in large part because of the preparation provided by Whipple. Not that Whipple is willing to take any of the credit.

"The difference in Ben this season, compared to last, is like night and day," he said. "There's no way that, a year ago, we could have had the game plan we had against Denver."

Just as they had against the Colts, when Roethlisberger threw for two touchdowns in the first quarter, the Steelers decided to come out throwing against the Broncos, and Big Ben responded by completing 21 of 29 passes for 275 yards and 2 touchdowns, without an interception. He also ran 4 yards for the Steelers' final TD.

Unlike last year, when Roethlisberger wasn't always entirely sure where his own guys were going to be, he nows seems to know where everyone on the field is.

"He sees the field so well," Whipple said. "The knowledge he's gained has slowed the game down for him. He knows our offense, our receivers much better, so he's better able to check out the defense.

"When the plays come in, he has a feel for what we want. And we know what he likes. He's much more comfortable now, and manages the game very well. He calls a lot more automatics at the line of scrimmage because he can read the defense and knows how to mix and match our receivers according to the coverage. That never would have happened last year."

What's happened this year is even more impressive considering that Roethlisberger has played most of the season with a sprained thumb on his throwing hand that hindered his ability to throw long passes. He also had arthroscopic knee surgery in midseason.

"For a while there," said Whipple, "he could't throw the ball properly. He couldn't get the right spin on the ball. He couldn't throw deep. He just couldn't get enough 'mustard' on the ball.

"He's almost all the way back now. There's no way he could have made some of the throws he made against Denver earlier in the year."

Ironically, the best play Roethlisberger may have made this year was not a pass completion, but a tackle.

Just when it seemed the Steelers had wrapped up their upset victory over the Colts in the AFC semifinals, having sacked Indianapolis QB Peyton Manning on his own 2-yard line with less than two minutes to go in the game, the usually sure-handed veteran, Jerome Bettis, lost a fumble near the goal line that was picked up by Colts cornerback Nick Harper.

For a second or two, it seemed as if Harper might go all the way for a game-winning touchdown. It was Roethlisberger who ran him down, tripping up Harper with a diving, ankle tackle.

"Ben made a great play," Whipple said. "When he came to the sidelines, he asked me: 'Did I get him down?' I told him: 'You bet your butt you did!' "

Throw for touchdowns, run for touchdowns, make touchdown-saving tackles -- there's no limit to what Roethlisberger can do.

And no question that Whipple has done a great job in developing the kid's considerable talents.