In many ways, last Thursday night’s showdown against the Cardinals felt like a season-defining type of game for the Seahawks.
Seattle was reeling, having suffered back-to-back losses and three defeats in its last four games. The embattled defense was just 10 days removed from a debacle in Buffalo that was among the worst defensive showings of the entire Pete Carroll era. And after an MVP-caliber start to the season, Russell Wilson was struggling through a highly uncharacteristic rash of turnovers.
A loss Thursday night would’ve been devastating. It would’ve dropped the Seahawks’ NFC West title odds to 14% and their odds of claiming the NFC’s top seed to just 2%, according to FiveThirtyEight. And it would’ve made a Super Bowl run seem more like a distant possibility than a realistic scenario.
Seattle’s backs were up against the wall.
And with so much at stake, the Seahawks answered the challenge and rose to the occasion with a pivotal 28-21 win over the visiting Cardinals.
The defense compiled its best and most encouraging performance of the season. Wilson bounced back with an efficient and nearly flawless outing. And now, with a very favorable remaining schedule, Seattle is well-positioned in the NFC West race and back in the thick of the battle for the conference’s top seed.
Here’s a look at some of the key storylines and takeaways following the Seahawks’ bounceback win over Arizona:
DEFENSE COMES THROUGH WITH BEST PERFORMANCE OF SEASON
The most encouraging aspect of Thursday night’s game was the performance by Seattle’s embattled defense. This was, by far, the unit’s best and most complete showing of the season.
Kyler Murray and the Arizona offense came into this showdown on a tear. The Cardinals had scored at least 30 points in each of their last five games, while averaging nearly 470 total yards per game over that stretch. For the season, they were averaging a league-high 425.4 yards per contest. Meanwhile, the Seahawks were allowing a league-worst 448.3 yards per game, which was on pace to break the NFL record.
But on Thursday night, it was Seattle’s defense that won the battle. The Seahawks held the Cardinals to 314 total yards and 21 points, the latter of which matched a season low for Arizona’s offense. Both of those numbers were season lows for Seattle’s defense.
Also, keep in mind that one of the Cardinals’ touchdown drives was extended by an unnecessary roughness penalty on safety Quandre Diggs that occurred on a third-down incompletion. If not for that self-inflicted mistake, the Cardinals’ yardage and point total might’ve been even lower.
The credit for Seattle’s defensive success Thursday night was widespread.
Most notably, the once-struggling pass rush had another strong game. The Seahawks had three sacks and a season-high 28 quarterback pressures, according to Pro Football Focus. And they did so against a good Arizona offensive line that’s tied for sixth in PFF’s team pass-blocking grades. Since posting just one three-sack game in its first six contests, Seattle has at least three sacks in each of its last four games.
Recently acquired defensive end Carlos Dunlap provided two of the team’s three sacks, including the game-sealing fourth-down takedown of Kyler Murray in the final minute. The pass rush also came through during a pivotal sequence earlier in the fourth quarter, when it forced back-to-back penalties that led to a safety. Star safety Jamal Adams began the sequence by blitzing off the edge and forcing Murray into an intentional grounding penalty, which backed up the Cardinals to their own 2-yard line. Then on the ensuing play, defensive end L.J. Collier burst up the middle and drew an end-zone holding penalty that resulted in a safety, which helped swing momentum and control of the game back to Seattle.
Part of the Seahawks’ recent pass-rush improvement can be attributed to an increased blitz rate over the last few weeks, especially in the San Francisco and Buffalo games. But it’s also because Seattle now has a bona fide edge rusher in Dunlap.
Since being acquired in the trade with Cincinnati, the two-time Pro Bowl defensive end has 3.5 sacks in three games with the Seahawks. He already has the second-most sacks on the team this season, and the most sacks among all of Seattle’s defensive linemen. Furthermore, Dunlap is tied for 10th in PFF’s pass rush productivity rating over the last three weeks. Prior to that, over the first eight weeks of the season, the Seahawks didn’t have a single defensive lineman ranked in the top 75 of that metric.
It also was particularly encouraging that all three of Seattle’s sacks Thursday night came on four- or five-man rushes. At times this season, the Seahawks have seemed overreliant on blitzing Adams, Bobby Wagner and others to make up for the defensive line’s pass-rushing deficiencies. But if Seattle can generate pressure more consistently with its linemen, that frees up players like Adams and Wagner to spend more time roaming their natural areas of the field, and it leaves the back end of the defense less vulnerable.
Another key factor in the Seahawks’ defensive success Thursday night was their ability to contain Murray, the most dangerous running quarterback in the league.
Murray entered the night averaging 67.1 rushing yards per game and had rushed for at least 60 yards in all but two contests. Seattle hardly blitzed in the teams’ first matchup, largely in an effort to keep Murray from getting loose. But that plan backfired, as the Seahawks not only failed to generate a single quarterback hit in that game, but also allowed Murray to run for 67 yards and a touchdown on 14 carries.
Seattle blitzed more often this time and generated significantly more pressure, while also doing an excellent job of containing the elusive Murray. The Seahawks completely held him in check on the ground, limiting the former top draft pick to a season-low 15 yards on five carries. Arizona’s rushing attack, which entered the night averaging a league-high 168.9 yards per game, managed just a season-low 57 yards.
One of the game’s signature plays was linebacker K.J. Wright’s outstanding open-field tackle of Murray on a key third-and-1 late in the first half. As Murray took off for the edge on a read-option keeper, he attempted to juke his way past Wright for the first down. But the veteran linebacker matched Murray step for step, stayed in front of him, and ultimately forced him to the ground for a 2-yard loss. It ended Arizona’s hopes of a late first-half scoring drive, and it was emblematic of Seattle’s success all night in corralling one of the league’s most dangerous dual-threat playmakers.
And in addition to strong play from their defensive line and linebackers, the Seahawks’ secondary played likely its best game of the year — despite missing its two starting outside cornerbacks.
Miscommunications and coverage breakdowns have plagued Seattle’s secondary all season long. But aside from the touchdown pass to a wide-open Chase Edmonds early in the fourth quarter, those miscues were mostly nonexistent Thursday night.
The Seahawks gave up just five completions of 15-plus yards, and none of more than 25 yards. They held Murray to just 6.4 yards per pass attempt, his third-lowest mark of the season. They limited star receiver DeAndre Hopkins — who entered with 95.7 receiving yards per game, which ranked second in the league — to five catches for 51 yards. And they capped the night with big pass breakups by Diggs and D.J. Reed on second and third down before Dunlap’s game-sealing sack on fourth down.
The question, of course, is whether Seattle can repeat this type of defensive performance on a consistent basis, or whether it was simply a blip in an otherwise dreadful season for this unit. To prove that it truly has turned a corner, the Seahawks’ defense will have to string together multiple games like this.
But the way Seattle’s defense achieved its success Thursday night seems sustainable. There wasn’t anything gimmicky about it. The defensive front created pressure against a good offensive line. The linebackers shut down Murray and the Cardinals’ prolific rushing attack. The secondary played sound and mostly mistake-free football while holding one of the league’s top receivers largely in check. And the unit should only get better with starting cornerback Shaquill Griffin on track to return from injury.
For the first time this season, the Seahawks put it all together on defense. Now, they have to prove they can make these types of performances the norm.
WILSON BOUNCES BACK WITH MISTAKE-FREE NIGHT
After an MVP-caliber start to the season, Russell Wilson had fallen into a highly uncharacteristic turnover funk.
Heading into Thursday night, Wilson had thrown seven interceptions and lost three fumbles over his last four games. Just how unusual was that for him? Prior to that four-game stretch, Wilson had gone 39 consecutive games without throwing multiple interceptions in a contest. But over those four games, he’d done so three times.
Wilson put those struggles to rest Thursday night.
Wilson bounced back with a highly efficient and nearly flawless performance, completing 23 of 28 passes for 197 yards, two touchdowns and — most importantly — no interceptions. He also rushed for 42 yards on 10 carries. And he essentially misfired on only one pass all night, as four of his five incompletions were either drops or throwaways.
Though Wilson’s passing yardage wasn’t on par with some of his stat-popping performances earlier this season, Pro Football Focus graded this as Wilson’s third-best game of the year. Wilson’s 89.4 offensive grade Thursday night was higher than every other game this season except for the Miami (91.8) and Atlanta (91.5) contests. And it was vastly better than his previous two games against the Bills (52.7) and Rams (41.4), when he posted his two worst offensive grades since the midway point of the 2017 season.
Keep in mind, too, that Wilson had a 41-yard completion to DK Metcalf that was called back by a questionable holding penalty. He threw another deep ball to Metcalf that resulted in a 46-yard pass-interference penalty, and thus didn’t show up in his stats. And three of Wilson’s passes were dropped, including a would-be touchdown strike to Metcalf in the closing seconds of the first half. Wilson very well could’ve finished closer to 300 yards passing and three touchdowns.
Wilson did seem to play a bit more conservative than usual, opting for a lot of shorter passes and scrambles instead of deep shots downfield. He had just two official pass attempts that were targeted 20-plus yards downfield, and just five that were targeted 10-plus yards downfield. He finished with 7.0 yards per attempt, which was his third-lowest mark of the season. After his recent turnover struggles, perhaps he overcompensated a bit with a safer-than-usual approach.
But regardless, this was a nice bounceback performance for Seattle’s superstar quarterback. And with some easier opposing defenses coming up, expect Wilson to get back to being more aggressive and taking his typical amount of downfield shots — while continuing to show that his recent rash of turnovers was simply a blip on the radar.
O-LINE PAVES WAY FOR PRODUCTIVE RUN GAME
There was an inaccurate narrative floating around parts of the NFL media world that Thursday night’s game marked a return to the Seahawks’ pre-2020 ways of running the football frequently and sporting a more balanced attack.
On the surface, that narrative seemed true. A quick glance at the box score would seem to indicate that Seattle had 31 run plays and 31 pass plays. But in reality, it was a far different story.
The box score fails to account for the fact that seven of the Seahawks’ 31 rushing attempts were Russell Wilson scrambles that came on designed pass plays. And two more of the rushing attempts were a fumbled snap and a kneeldown. When factoring in those details, the Seahawks actually had 38 designed pass plays and 22 designed run plays. That ratio is pretty consistent with the pass-heavy approach Seattle’s offense has been taking all season.
It’s true that the Seahawks did run the ball slightly more often Thursday night. Running-back carries made up 33.9% of Seattle’s offensive plays, which was its third-highest rate of the season. It was a slight uptick from its 28.5% rate over the first nine games.
But the difference in the Seahawks’ run game Thursday night wasn’t that they ran the ball significantly more often. They were still very much a pass-first team.
Rather, it was simply that they ran the ball more effectively.
Led by a dominant run-blocking performance from the offensive line, Seattle’s running backs combined for 123 yards rushing at an average of 5.9 yards per carry. It was just the second time all season that the Seahawks’ running backs have averaged at least five yards per carry in a game. Entering the night, the running backs were averaging 4.1 yards per carry for the season.
Backup tailback Carlos Hyde, making his return from a three-game injury absence, rushed for a team-high 79 yards and a touchdown on 14 carries. Bo Scarbrough added 31 yards on six carries and DeeJay Dallas ran for a 13-yard gain on his lone carry. All three running backs had at least one gain of 12-plus yards.
The bulk of the credit, though, goes to the offensive line. Arizona was missing two starting defensive linemen, and Seattle’s offensive line took advantage by paving open running lanes with regularity. According to Pro Football Focus grading, three of the top nine run-blocking performances among offensive linemen in Week 11 belonged to Seahawks, as Damien Lewis, Mike Iupati and Duane Brown each posted run-blocking grades above 82.
And after Thursday night’s success on the ground, Seattle’s rushing attack should receive an added boost with starting running back Chris Carson set to return from injury for next Monday night’s game at Philadelphia.
LOOKING AHEAD
The Seahawks now embark on one of the easiest four-game stretches an NFL team can have. Seattle’s next four opponents — the Eagles, Giants, Jets and Washington — have a combined 9-30-1 record and an average ranking of 26.5 out of 32 teams in Football Outsiders’ DVOA ratings. Following this four-game stretch, the Seahawks close the regular season with divisional matchups against the Rams and 49ers.
Seattle (7-3) is currently tied with the Rams (7-3) atop the NFC West, with both teams holding a one-game lead over Arizona (6-4). According to FiveThirtyEight, the Seahawks have a 43% chance of winning the division. The Rams are a slight favorite at 45%, while the Cardinals have just a 12% chance.
Seattle also is tied with Green Bay (7-3) for the second-best record in the NFC, with both teams one game behind the Saints (8-2) in the race for the conference’s top seed and lone first-round bye. According to FiveThirtyEight, the Saints (34%) are the favorite to capture the top seed, followed by the Packers (23%), Rams (20%) and Seahawks (20%).
To earn the top seed, Seattle probably has to win out. If the Seahawks win each of their remaining six games, they would have an 83% chance at the top seed, per FiveThirtyEight. If they win five of their final six games, then their odds would vary between 19% and 49%, depending on which game they lose.
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