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Seattle Seahawks defense leads the way in 24-3 win over Los Angeles Rams

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Seahawks Cliff Avril stuff Rams Jared Goff ( Brandon Farris Photography)

The Seattle Seahawks (9-4-1) clinched their fourth NFC West Division title under head coach Pete Carroll with a stout defensive effort that jumped kicked a sluggish offense to a 24 to 3 win over  Division rivals Los Angeles Rams.

The Seattle defense answered the call to action early and oftenThursday night. The inspired  Seahawks defense stopped the Rams offense on its first possession of the game.Unfortunately, the Seahawks offense continued its sleepwalking routine from last Sunday’s lethargic showing at Green Bay and self-destructed after getting two false start penalties on its first possession of the game and promptly punted the ball back to the Rams.

The Rams offense looked liked it would be first to score when Jared  Goff drove the team down to the Seattle seven yard line but was unable to go any further as the Seattle defense held the Rams Todd Gurley to no gain on a 4th down and one.

 

INSPIRED SEATTLE  OFFENSE
The defensive stand woke up the Seattle offense from its sleepwalk routine and the unit promptly marched 93 yards down the field and broke the scoreless deadlock when Russell Wilson hit Luke Wilson on an  8-yard pass play to give the Seahawks the 7-0 lead with 12:27 left in the first quarter. The Seattle defense held the Rams to a  three and out and the  Seahawks increased their lead to 10-7 on a 48-yard field goal by Steven Hauschka. The Rams offense found its rhythm right before half and narrowed the Seattle lead to 10-7 on a 36-yard field goal by Greg Zuerlein.

FIRST HALF REPEAT
The Seattle offense sputtered coming out of the halftime break punted. Just like the first half the Seattle defense stood tall and forced a Rams Punt. And right on cue the offense marched 62 yards and scored on a one-yard pass play when Russell Wilson found a wide open Doug Baldwin for the  Touchdown to stretch Seattle lead to 17-3. The Seattle defense continued it’s dominance of the Rams offense and the Seahawks offense clicked once again and put the game out of reach when Russell Wilson made it three touchdowns for the day when he hit Tyler Lockett on a 57-yard pass play to complete the scoring at 24-3.

Seahawks Luke Wilson celebrates touchdown catch. ( Brandon Farris Photography)

While the game was a bounce back for the team as a whole, the improved one game performance was a point of satisfaction for Wilson who’s performance was a far cry from last Sunday’s  career low performance.

TAKEAWAYS

This is a difficult team to figure out in that you never really know what you are going to get outside of hard and determined effort.  Outside of the Carolina game, there is no other game where the team executed in all phases of the game. The 40 to 7 win over the Panthers was followed by a lackluster 38-10  loss to the Green Bay Packers. The win over the Panthers came on the heels of an unexplainable 5-14 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The question that has and continues to loom is, can this team string together a two or three-game win streak and create some momentum heading into the postseason? Seattle’s last two games are at home Dec 24th vs the 4-10  Arizona Cardinals and January 1st at the 1-12 San Francisco 49ers.

Rams continue mastery over Seahawks with 9-3 win

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Seahawks Russell Wilson looks for an open receiver.
Seahawks Russell Wilson looks for an open receiver.

he venue might have changed but the result was the same Sunday afternoon as the Los Angeles Rams beat the Seattle Seahawks 9-3 as 91,046 fans filled the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum to welcome Professional football back to Southern California.

The Los Angeles Rams were playing their first game back in the Coliseum since their relocation from St. Louis. Just like in St Louis, the Rams defeated the Seahawks for their third straight win, and fourth in the last five games over the Seahawks since 2012.

Sundays game between the NFC West division rivals had the usual narrative, a hard hitting defensive contest between two  teams that respect each other and hell bent on beating the stuffing out of the other.  For Seattle the effort was there but the execution was lacking when it was needed.

Seattle out-gained the Rams 306-283 but lost the field position battle and most importantly the turnover battle. Seattle quarterback Russell Wilson was 22 of 35 for 254 yards, sacked twice and was visibly bothered  by a sprained ankle suffered in last week’s win over the Dolphins.

The Rams defense was able to limit Wilson’s ability to run by bringing pressure from the outside and inside  limiting  Wilson’s options to run and limiting Seattle ability to use the read option package in it’s offensive sets.

As  result Seattle was a merger  4-for 13 on third down conversions.  Seattle had one transgression and it was a major one. After catching  pass from Wilson, Christine Michael fumbled the ball on the Rams 27 yard with 57 seconds to go in the game and Seattle driving for a possible game winning score.

To blame the game on Michael’s fumble would be disingenuous and inaccurate. The Seattle offense struggled all afternoon and was never able to overcome the field position battle. Seattle started seven of it’s 10 possessions inside the 20 yard  line and the other three started at the 25 yard line.

“We have not been able to shift the field position in our own favor,” head coachPete  Carroll said  after the game. “And when you don’t get turnovers, you can’t change what’s happening. This is a fine punting team and they did a nice job on us, so we had to overcome that, and we weren’t able to overcome that today.”

While the offense struggled, the Seattle defense stifled the Rams offense and gave up just three field goals. LA Rams quarterback Case Keenum was 18 of 30 for 239 yard and was sacked three times. The Rams were 3 for 12 on third down. Running  back Todd Gurley was held to 51 yards on 19 carries.

 

 

 

Coachers corner, Carroll and Fisher on Sundays game

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Seahawks running back Thomas Rawls

The Seattle Seahawks travel to the LA Coliseum this Sunday to take on the Los Angeles Rams in the  first regulars season game in the NF L coliseum in 22 years.  While the venue is new, the Seahawks facing the LA Rams is business as usual. Sunday will be the 36th time the two teams have faced off against each other. While Seattle leads the series with a 21-14 record, the Rams swept the two game season series against Seattle last year.

Week One.

The Rams will be trying to overcome a 28-0 beat down handed to them by the San Francisco 49ers at Levi Stadium last Monday night. The Rams managed just 185 total yards offense  and  were 3/15 on  third down conversions during the Monday Night disaster. The Rams

Seattle on the other hand will be trying to build on a tough 12 to 10 win over a stubborn  Miami Dolphins team. Seattle quarterback Russell Wilson injured his ankle in the  game but did not miss an offensive series and engineered a 14 play 75 yard drive game winning drive with 31 seconds left in the game

Coaches corner.

Los Angeles Rams Coach Jeff Fischer.

(On how much excitement there is for their first regular season home game in Los Angeles) 

“Well we’re shaking off Monday night and getting started today. I know the guys are really excited about week two. Especially getting the chance to play here. We’ve been on the road for three consecutive weeks. The last two preseason games and then at San Francisco [49ers.] Then we have a home game and then five more on the road. But it will be nice to open at home. The guys really enjoyed the [Los Angeles] Coliseum experience with the first two preseason games. I think the fans will be excited. This should be a great ball game.”

(On if there’s a common thread in his success over the Seahawks in previous years)

“No. I don’t think you can point to any one thing in particular. We just play and try to hang on. It’s a tremendous challenge when you’re defending their offense with Russell [Wilson] and the run game. They’re a very well coached offensive team. Then their defense is hard to score points against. They just don’t give up points. If you look back over the years, [you’ll see] the great job that they’ve done week after week. Even if you look back at last weekend. I think Miami [Dolphins] is a pretty good football team and that’s an impressive defensive effort. So no, we’re just going to try and hang in there and see what happens.”

(On what he feels were the primary issues with the offense in Monday’s matchup against the 49ers)

“Look at the play by play. We couldn’t complete third downs, we didn’t have any explosive plays and we struggled running the football. You need to make some plays and the [San Francisco] 49ers defense was well prepared.  They took some things away and we had some opportunities. Defensively when we started the second half, we got three or four consecutive three and outs. We had some good field position, we just couldn’t take advantage of it.”

Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll

Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson

Opening Statement

“Okay we’re back at it again. This is really fun stuff. Back to the regular season again. We’ve got a division game coming up. Big trip for us. Going down south for the first time and playing in Los Angeles for the first time in the division. There’s a lot of fun stuff about this matchup and we want to play really good football. We’ve got a lot of getting better to do. It was really obvious. We’re going to dig in, in a number of areas.

“[We’re going to] try to clean things up and improve our game. We did some things that should have helped us more in the game [against Miami last week.] We had situations in the game that we needed to take advantage of but didn’t get that done. So we’re going to get better and that’s what this whole season is. Working to get better every week and we’re going to do that this week. Rams come off a tough game on Monday night. It didn’t go the way they wanted it to go but they’re coming home.

“They’re going to be all pumped up and we know that. We have a lot of respect for this team. We’ve had them in the division for all these years and we know how difficult they are. We’re going to plan accordingly and see if we can put together a really good game and get this thing going in week two.”

On how Russell Wilson is feeling as he recovers from his ankle injury

“His attitude is as charged up as you can imagine. As always, he’s excited to prove that he can make this back and get back and all that. He’s half crazy about proving it. So he’s good and his attitude is great.”

On if there are times where a team looked bad the week before and came back strong the next week) 

“You really don’t take teams lightly in this league. They’re too good. We don’t ever do that. This is a really difficult team and for whatever reason the 49ers had their way in the first game. But these guys were 4-2 in the division last year and we know that. We’ve had difficult games with them because they are tough to handle. We have a lot of respect for them and we’re not going to miss that at all.”

Mazvita Maraire is the Sports Editor for NWFACT.Com, the Tacoma Facts and Seattle Facts Newspapers. Follow him on twitter @ MazvitaMaraire