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The Seahawks move to 5-1 after outlasting the Titans in an ugly, mistake-riddled game. This was Seattle's 11th straight win at home.
We saw an exceedingly Pete Carroll end-of-the-first-half - possibly the most Pete Carroll end-of-the-first-half of all time - and while driving deep into Tennessee territory, Seattle's patented sloppy end-of-half time management with-no-timeouts-remaining forced them to attempt a field goal from the 4-yard line with 0:02 remaining. This was culminated by backup holder Chris Maragos' botched hold and subsequent inexplicable and inexcusable attempt to "pass" whilst horizontal to the ground and surrounded by three or four defenders. Naturally, as you'd fully expect in a Pete Carroll end-of-the-first-half situation, the worst possible scenario unfolded, and the Titans recovered it and returned it for a touchdown. At the half, the Seahawks trailed 10-7.
Thankfully, the defense stayed strong in the second half (the defense was the story of this game, easily), the offense managed to put together a few drives, and Seattle escaped with a win. Here are a few notables.
- Russell Wilson finished 23-of-31 for 257 yards passing. Very few offensive pass plays were executed within the construct of the offense, and the name of the game was Russell Wilson improvisation and evasion. He finished with 61 yards rushing, to push his total in the past two games to 164 yards.
- Nonetheless, somehow, Seattle racked up 404 yards of offense, including 151 yards on the ground, and if you were looking at a box score, you would have thought this was a complete blowout. Tennessee finished with 223 total yards of offense, 157 through the air and 66 on the ground. That's domination by the defense.
- Earl Thomas and Richard Sherman both got picks. The Titans decision to throw a go-route to Nate Washington to Richard Sherman's side had to have been the stupidest thing that happened in this whole game, and that's saying something. Sherman picked the ball off, Seattle scored a touchdown on the subsequent possession to go up two scores with 7:37 remaining.
- Marshawn Lynch rushed 21 times for 77 yards and two scores. He also led the team in receiving with 4 receptions for 78 yards.
- Doug Baldwin really came up huge again, catching 4 passes for 48 yards. Golden Tate had one very impressive play on a swing pass where he made one guy miss and then lowered the boom on a defensive back, bowling him over and moving on for a first down. Sidney Rice, after fumbling away the ball earlier in the game, had a big toe-touch catch on the sideline on that final scoring drive for the Hawks. All in all, though, the offensive pass game still has a long way to go and third downs were still a bit of an issue (38%).
More soon. Talk.