Archive for the '2006 Seahawks Recaps' Category

40 carries. 201 yards. Forty carries. Forty! This from a guy who’s just in his 2nd game back from a broken foot, and who plays on a Mike Holmgren offense. Amazing, surprising, and the key to winning a Monday Night Football game over the Packers in Qwest Field conditions that looked more like Green Bay than Seattle. Let’s just hope Shaun Alexander feels fine in the morning.

It’s obvious Matt Hasselbeck was rusty: 3 INTs on the first 4 possessions, and a fumble later in the 1st half that led to a Packer TD. He was 10-22 for only 88 yards in the first half. Meanwhile, Shaun Alexander had already passed 100 rushing yards by halftime on 19 carries. So, what do you do when you have a rusty QB and you find yourself down 21-12 in the opening minutes of the 3rd quarter?

You don’t put the game in your QB’s hands. The next two Seahawk TD drives, which put them up 27-21, were a near perfect split: 10 passes and 9 rushes over the two drives. Great play-calling, perfect balance, and 59 yards on the ground from Shaun Alexander. All of that seemed to calm MattHass down, and he had a much better 2nd half — 7-14, 69 yards, and 3 TDs.

I thought the defense was solid overall. The Packers first two scores were on a short drive after an INT and a fumble return. The only other TD Green Bay scored was the one defensive breakdown Seattle had — letting Donald Driver take a short slant 48 yards for a TD.

The weather didn’t seem to be much of a factor. There weren’t a lot of slips that I saw. Probably the biggest impact was dropped passes — slippery when wet, perhaps?

In any case, if you’re a Seahawk fan you have to love what you saw in the 2nd half and hope that is the Seahawk team we’ve been waiting to see all year.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Shaun Alexander, but honorable mentions go to DJ Hackett, Nate Burleson, and Josh Brown. Hackett just seems to catch everything thrown his way. I hope he still sees plenty of action after Bobby Engram comes back. Burleson made 3 catches and had a great night returning punts and kicks. And Josh Brown kept the Hawks in the game during that sloppy 1st half.

Play of the game: MattHass to Darrell Jackson, 4-yard TD, putting the Hawks up 27-21 early in the 4th. It was the game-winning score, but it was also a perfect throw and an amazing catch. Charles Woodson got a hand on the ball, and kept his hand in D-Jack’s face, but Jackson still held on and got two feet down.

Next up: Sunday night at Denver. The Broncos are 7-4, have dropped 2 straight, and just named rookie Jay Cutler their starting QB for the rest of the season. Raise your hand if you want John Marshall to turn the defense loose on Cutler they same way he did on Oakland’s Andrew Walters….

It’d be easy to put the blame on Seneca Wallace for his 3 INTs, including that painful one late in the 4th quarter, but the Seahawks lost this game in the first half with what has to be their worst 30 minutes of football all season: Penalties, turnovers, and the worst tackling I’ve ever seen.

Wallace has been doing exactly what he’s been asked to do the past couple games: manage the game, and don’t turn the ball over. That, combined with a renewed rushing game and solid defense, gave the Hawks a modest 2-game winning streak. And today, the Seahawks got none of that. I already mentioned Wallace. The rushing game was MIA, even with Shaun Alexander back in the starting lineup. And the defense was MIA — anyone see Julian Peterson do anything against his old team? The ‘D’ let Frank Gore run all over the field — 212 yards on 24 carries. It was like watching Larry Johnson and Chester Taylor dice up the defense earlier this season. Frank Gore is good, but he’s no Larry Johnson — at least not normally. SF, as a team, averaged 7.7 yards per rush.

Ugly, ugly, ugly. And now, suddenly, we have a race again in the NFC West. The 49ers are just a game behind and come to Seattle in Week 15.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Deion Branch had to be the best guy in blue & white today. 7 catches, 113 yards, and a TD. Plackemeier also kicked the heck out of the ball, but I’m not gonna pimp the punter over a WR who scored and caught passes.

Play of the game: The whole first half is when the game was lost; there was no single play that did it. The Stevens catch and fumble hurt big time. I can’t help but wonder how deep in Holmgren’s doghouse he’s going. Obviously the failed Alexander run on 4th down and the INT late in the game didn’t help, but the game was lost in the first 30 minutes.

Next up: At home on Monday night against the Packers. Green Bay got railed today by the Patriots, 35-0, to fall to 4-6.

You kind of expect it now from Josh Brown. You don’t expect it from Nate Burleson. Yet those two, combined with a moronic penalty on St. Louis’ Richie Incognito and a moronic decision by Rams coach Scott Linehan, combined to produce another thrilling win for the Seahawks’ 2nd team. And make no mistake about it, this was a 2nd team win. Missing offensive starters today? Hasselbeck, Alexander, Engram, Locklear, and Tobeck.

Tobeck’s loss can probably account for the inconsistencies on the offensive side of the ball. The running game was solid with 160 total yards. Pass protection was another story: Without Tobeck making adjustments at the line, the Hawks allowed 6 sacks — 2 of which led to lost fumbles. Ouch.

Still, Wallace did a very fine job again today of game management. Darrell Jackson added to his terrific season. On the defensive side, the Hawks managed 4 sacks — two of which came when STL was deep in Seattle territory, and helped limit the Rams to FGs. And perhaps most importantly, the secondary only allowed one pass play of 20+ yards.

But special teams can claim this win today, with Nate Burleson getting the Hawks first punt return for TD in 3 years on a play where I’m sure everyone reading this was yelling at the TV, “Fair catch! Call a fair catch!” And then cool Josh Brown comes in and hits the game-winning FG in less than ideal conditions with 9 seconds left.

Now the Hawks are 2 games up in the division with a series sweep of the Rams.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Josh Brown and Nate Burleson. Can’t give it to one without the other.

Play of the game: Obviously, the game-winning FG. But Burleson’s return was huge. And don’t overlook that late pass when Wallace hit D-Jack for 10 yards to get the ball into FG range in the final minute. Huge completion.

Next up: At San Francisco. The 49ers, at 4-5, are now tied with the Rams for 2nd place in the NFC West. SF beat Detroit today for a 2-game winning streak. Key stat: SF’s 251 points allowed is the worst in the NFL.

The Oakland Raiders were just what the doctor ordered for the banged up and slumping Seahawks. Seattle got better on both sides of the ball tonight, but there has to be an asterisk next to this win: It was against the Raiders.

Defensively, the plan was to blitz the living daylights out of Oakland, and it produced an incredible 9 sacks. That’s as much a statement about Oakland’s system as anything — they just kept sending Walter back for 7-step drops, waiting for long, drawn-out pass routes to open up, and giving the defense all kinds of time to get to the QB. Of course, you still need to the secondary to play well in order to score 9 blitzes, and I thought this was one of the better games of the year for the CBs and Safeties.

Offensively, Seneca Wallace did exactly what you want a backup QB to do: Manage the game, don’t turn the ball over, and make a couple big plays when you can. Maurice Morris had a career day with 138 yards and 30 carries. But despite all that, I didn’t think the OL played all that great. Floyd Womack made Warren Sapp look like a kid again. And I’m pretty sure Tom Ashworth just got whistled for a false start in the Seahawks’ locker room. And there’s also this cause for concern: On three drives into the red zone, the Hawks had to settle for 3 FGs.

Random Thoughts:

Is it just me, or does Art Shell look like a statue out there? He just looks completely clueless.

I was thinking earlier this week about how seldom we’ve heard Grant Wistrom’s name this season, so it was nice to see him put together his best game of the season.

I sure do like DJ Hackett. Even with the rain and slippery ball, I don’t recall him dropping a pass all night.

I can’t believe they had Brian Bosworth on the ESPN broadcast…..

Watching the game at the Fox Sports Grill was a blast!

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Craig Terrill and Rocky Bernard. They dominated the Raiders OL — 5 sacks total from interior DL men. Bernard also had at least one pass deflection and made some other nice tackles on top of his two sacks. Mo Morris gets an honorable mention here for his career day rushing.

Play of the game: This wasn’t a game where you can say one play turned the tide or secured the win. There was an important 4th down that the Raiders missed midway through the 4th quarter, but even if they had made it … would it have mattered much? Probably not. So I’ll go with the prettiest offensive play, which was the TD pass from Wallace to Branch. That got the Hawks and the home crowd going — and it ended up as the winning points.

Next up: From one of the worst offenses to one of the best. The 4-4 STL Rams come to Qwest Field on Sunday. A Seahawks win puts them in the driver’s seat for winning the NFC West.

On Sundays, there are three lists on the right side of the NFL.com home page. These lists show the top QB, top RB, and top receiver around the league — each one measured in terms of yards. At halftime of the Seahawks-Chiefs game, there was a Kansas City player on top of all three lists. That tells you what kind of day the Seahawks’ defense had.

By day’s end, the Chiefs put up staggering numbers: 499 total yards, 42:15 time of possession, 30 first downs, 79 plays from scrimmage, almost 20 yards per completion, a 300-yd. day by QB Damon Huard, a 155-yd. day from RB Larry Johnson, and two receivers with more than 100 yards (Eddie Kennison and Tony Gonzalez).

And still, with 6:30 to go in the game, the Seahawks somehow had a 28-27 lead after Seneca Wallace’s 3rd TD pass of the day — a 49-yard flying duck to a wide open Darrell Jackson. But the defense had no chance on the following drive, letting KC march 80 yards on 8 plays for the winning score. It was a microcosm of the day: big plays by KC, missed tackles and no resistance from the Seahawks.

Seneca Wallace was the big story coming into the game, but the big story coming out is the Hawks’ defense. Wallace acquitted himself admirably, though there were about 5-10 plays during the game where you thought, “You know, Matt would have hit that receiver.” But Wallace wasn’t the problem. He showed up and played well enough. The defense didn’t.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Julian Peterson made some good defensive plays, but he also got beat badly a couple times by Tony Gonzalez. Still, I’ll let him and Seneca share the honors. Wallace was infinitely better than most of us expected, and almost figured out a way to overcome an overall embarrassingly poor game from the defense.

Play of the game: The Huard-to-Kennison 51-yard pass late in the 4th quarter. Kennison got completely free from Marcus Trufant, but still had to stretch every inch of his body to make a great catch as Ken Hamlin was closing in on him. He made it, went down on the Seahawks’ 7 yard line, and Johnson scored the game-winner three plays later.

Next up: Monday night at home against the Raiders, who’ve now won two in a row after somehow beating the Steelers today. Oakland intercepted 4 passes, 2 for TDs. Their offense mustered only 17 yards passing, 98 overall for the game. Far cry from what KC put up today, but the result was the same.

Losing a game is never fun, but some losses hurt more than others — and sometimes for a variety of reasons. This loss is one of those that hurts as bad as a loss can hurt. Two reasons why:

1) The obvious reason: Matt Hasselbeck’s injury. No one is saying anything about it, and as I write this, very little is known other than the knee sprain we heard during the game. He’ll have tests tomorrow.

2) The Seahawks were manhandled on both sides of the ball. They lost, and they looked bad doing it. The defense allowed big plays and sustained drives. The offense managed only two FGs over the last 55 minutes of the game. Special teams gave up almost 200 yards in punt and kickoff returns.

I would add Holmgren to the list of offenders, too. His play-calling was suspect before and after the MattHass injury. The Seahawks never seemed to find that rhythm, which is what happens when you have smart play-calling and good execution. The Seahawks had neither.

If you want to look on the bright side, the Seahawks are still 4-2 and still on top of the division and there’s a lot of football left to be played. Losing to the Vikings isn’t the end of the world.

Losing Matt Hasselbeck? Might be.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Julian Peterson was strong again on the defensive side, but I’ll reluctantly go with Darrell Jackson. He had a good game and made the only big play the Seahawks had. I say “reluctantly” because he also brain-farted on that 4th-quarter catch and cost the Seahawks a 1st down. Not that it really mattered much by then….

Play of the game: The 95-yard TD was one thing, but if MattHass is in the game, you still assume the Hawks can come back from 24-10 with 5 minutes left in the 3rd quarter. So the play of the game was MattHass’s injury. Let’s hope it’s not the play of the season.

Next up: @ Kansas City. The Chiefs improved to 3-3 with a big home win today over the Chargers. KC held LaDainian Tomlinson to just 66 yards rushing.

I have a feeling that Mike Holmgren’s halftime speech went something like this:

“We’re down 21-7. We’re playing like a high school team. We’re getting beat by the 1st place team in the division. You have two quarters — 30 minutes of football — to decide the answer these questions: What direction are you going? Are we a team on the rise, or are we declining? Are we contenders again, or pretenders?”

While we’ll all remember the miraculous finish to this game, how cool under pressure MattHass performed with no time outs left on the final drive, and Josh Brown’s hammer from 54-yards out on the final play … the fact is the Seahawks won this thing with a dominating overall performance after halftime. The Seahawks’ defense held the Rams to just 71 yards in the second half prior to that last (incredible) play — the 67-yard score from Bulger to Holt. They bothered Bulger, they sacked Bulger, and they forced his first INT in forever. Special teams forced a big 2nd half turnover. The offense scored on four consecutive possessions in the 2nd half, and their only 3-and-out ended with a FG, not a punt.

All of that is why and how the Seahawks won this game, and regained 1st place in the NFC West.

Random Notes:

* Nice to see Maurice Morris get it going in the 2nd half, which was a big factor in the success of the offense. No rushing game = no chance. And Holmgren deserves credit for not ignoring the running game entirely after being down at halftime.

* I still get nervous on every FG just because Plackemeier is the holder. Why not have Wallace do that? With a QB back there, you have the threat/luxury of being able to run a fake and succeed.

* I wonder if MattHass is hurt more than we’ve been told. For every perfect pass he had today, there was one equally ugly pass that had no chance.

* I really like seeing DJ Hackett out there. He always seems to make plays.

* Don’t overlook the job the defense did on Steven Jackson. Holding him to 56 yds. on 20 carries is something to be proud of. In fact, the D held STL to just 2.7 yds. per carry for the game.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: MattHass really has to carry the offense when there’s no Shaun Alexander behind him, and despite a few pretty bad throws, he was terrific. He had three TDs, no turnovers, and just took over in the 2nd half. That last drive was a thing of beauty. Close runners-up have to be Josh Brown, along with both Bryce Fisher and Julian Peterson.

Play of the game: There were so many huge plays in this game, but the play of the game is obviously Josh Brown’s walk-off FG.

Next up: The Steve Hutchinson Bowl. (Minnesota visits Seattle.) The Vikings are 3-2 and had a bye today.

I suppose you could accuse me of being a homer, but I don’t believe the Bears are as good as they looked tonight, nor do I believe the Seahawks are as bad as they looked tonight. But none of that matters much because the final score shows Chicago was way too good for Seattle tonight.

The announcers are right when they talked about Shaun Alexander’s presence not making much of a difference. His absence wasn’t the problem. The Hawks were outplayed and outcoached tonight and there’s not a single player or unit that did its job. Well, at least the FG team went 2-for-2 with no blocks. Yippee.

Terrible game. What else can be said? How about this: In the last 5 quarters, the Seahawks have been outscored 64-6.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Not applicable. No one on the Seahawks did anything to deserve a pat on the back….

Play of the game: You could probably pick any number of plays, but I think the 2nd INT that MattHass threw was about when you knew this just wasn’t going to work tonight. There were about 5 minutes to go in the 1st half at that point, and the Bears turned the INT into a 20-3 lead and the game was pretty well finished by that point.

Next up: A week off and then a trip to St. Louis to face the Rams, who outscored Detroit today 41-34.

It’s a shame the score ended up as it did, because the record needs to show that this was a complete annihilation of the Giants. The Seahawks led 21-0 after one quarter, 35-3 at halftime, and 42-3 after the third quarter. How lopsided did it get? Bad enough that Will Heller caught a TD pass and actually put his hands to his ear in the end zone calling out for some love from the Qwest Field faithful. When you see your 3rd string tight end hamming it up after a TD like that, you know the rout is on.

And it may have left the Giants in bad shape as a team. Said Jeremy Shockey afterward: “We got outplayed, and outcoached. Write that down.” Tom Coughlin has never been loved by his players, but comments like that can’t be good.

Deion Branch looked good in Seahawk blue, though I think MattHass tried to force him the ball a couple times. It’ll be nice to watch the 4-receiver set develop as the season goes along. They should be able to add new wrinkles in to keep defenses guessing, much like the Giants were today.

But, the Seahawks can still play the “concerned” card after this one. They played their best 3 quarters of the season, and followed it up with their worst one quarter. I don’t care how big your lead is after 3 quarters, there’s no excuse for giving up 27 points in one quarter. That’s a concern. Shaun Alexander also has to be a concern — his foot/ankle really limited him, and the Giants did, too. Can’t blame the poor rushing all on injuries. Mo Morris only had 18 yards on 15 attempts.

In the end, a great win for the Seahawks, who were light years better than what they showed in the first two weeks.

Random Notes:

- Darryl Tapp sure looks good in his limited playing time. (This comment left untouched from last week’s recap.)

- Nate Burleson dropped the easiest pass he’ll ever see, but aside from that, had his best game of the season.

- The Seahawks have a really, really good defense. I still expect the secondary to have its struggles, but when the front 7 are flying around like they do, that makes up for some issues in the defensive backfield.

- Best way to avoid having a FG blocked? Score TDs every time you get in FG range.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: Would’ve given this to MattHass if not for his 4th quarter, so instead I’m gonna give it to Ken Hamlin, whose INTs in the 1st quarter really set the tone for the whole day, or at least for the first 3 quarters.

Play of the game: I’ll go with Hamlin again, for the very first INT of the game. After that controversial INT that MattHass threw on the first play of the game, the Hamlin INT just three plays later was huge. He took the ball all the way down to the NYG 15-yard line, he killed the Giants momentum, and got the crowd right back in the game after the Seahawks’ INT. It was all Seahawks after Hamlin’s INT….

Next up: On the road for the national Sunday night game at Chicago. The Bears are 3-0 after winning at Minnesota today. All the focus will be on Chicago’s defense and the Seahawks’ offense, but I expect the Hawks’ defense to dominate the Bears.

Another uninspiring performance, and another win. The main difference from last week to this week is that we saw flashes of Seahawk brilliance on a couple occasions during this game — a reminder of last season and hopefully a preview of what’s to come.

As was the case last week, the defense carried the weight of this win. Everybody loves to talk about the Cardinals having the best set of skill players around, but our defense kept Edgerrin James, Larry Fitzgerald, and Anquan Boldin in check. The Hawks held AZ overall to just 256 yards and piled up 5 sacks. They really only made one mistake all day, and that was when Bryant Johnson got behind the secondary for Arizona’s only TD. Great game from the defense.

Still, what you’ll remember from this game are the mistakes: dropped passes, penalties that negated turnovers, another botched FG, 12-27 passing with 2 INTs, etc. The Seahawks are 2-0, alone in 1st in the division, but are not clicking yet and have plenty of stuff to work on.

Random Notes:

- Darryl Tapp sure looks good in his limited playing time.

- Maurice Morris keeps making big play after big play when he gets a chance.

- Tony Siragusa sure is useless as a sideline reporter.

Link: NFL.com Recap

Game ball: I thought Kelly Herndon had another solid game, and Leroy Hill was all over the place. But the game ball this week goes to Darrell Jackson. 5 catches for 127 yards and a TD, and he looked pretty quick out there to me. Bad knees?

Play of the game: Mack Strong leaping over an AZ defender was the “play of the game,” but it wasn’t the most important play of the game. Kelly Herndon’s forced fumbled on Adam Bergen (with Lofa Tatupu recovering) was huge in the 4th quarter. (see photo above) Arizona had just scored a TD on their previous drive to make it 21-10, and MattHass followed that up with an ugly INT. The Cardinals were in Seahawk territory and looking to make it a 4-point game. Herndon’s play killed all their momentum and sealed the win.

Next up: Home game against the NY Football Giants, which will involve Fox’s entire studio crew and #1 play-by-play crew coming out to Qwest Field. The Giants made an amazing rally today in Philly to beat the Eagles in OT, and will provide a very good measuring stick for the Seahawks next week. They’ll have to improve to beat New York.