How They Got Here, Weeks 17-20

Cory Puffett

Four weeks at a time actually worked out pretty well. In all, I’ve watched 36 football games in the past five days and I’ll be watching a 37^th tonight. Here are my notes on the Broncos and Seahawks from Week 17 through their conference championship victories.

Week 17

Denver Broncos (at Oakland)

Denver won the coin toss but decided to defer to the second half. They still had their best first half of the season, scoring on all five first half possessions with Manning breaking the single-season passing yards record and throwing four touchdowns. Brock Osweiler played in the second half and he looked good, making great decisions and playing the pocket much like Peyton. But his reads are significantly slower than Manning, as expected.

The defense played an excellent game. Pryor made a few nice reads on the defense but couldn’t find any consistency as Denver contained him and McFadden and did not give him many spaces to throw to.

Seattle Seahawks (vs. St. Louis)

The Seahawks defense was dominant for almost the entire game, giving up just one late-game touchdown drive. It certainly didn’t hurt that St. Louis shot itself in the foot so many times with personal foul and unsportsmanlike conduct penalties.

Seattle’s offense had two really nice drives, one of which was mostly just a long touchdown pass to Golden Tate. For the most part, though, the offense had a good play here and there but sputtered before getting into St. Louis territory.

Wild Card

Denver Broncos (BYE)

Seattle Seahawks (BYE)

Divisional Round

Denver Broncos (vs. San Diego)

The offense was all over San Diego in the first half. The Chargers had some trouble staying on their side of the neutral zone, although one of those calls was incorrect. Denver had a good game running the ball even into the second half.

Denver’s defense cruised through the first half. They had to spend more time on the field in the second half, and it was evident that they started getting fatigued as the half wore on. They tightened up when it counted though. The secondary and linebackers mostly played in pass protection and the linemen did a good job of keeping the pressure on Rivers and not giving him any opening to step up in the pocket.

Seattle Seahawks (vs. New Orleans)

Seattle’s biggest issue on defense was against the run in the first half, but they forced a turnover and then adjusted in the second half, so that balanced itself out. They struggled a little against the pass right at the end of the third quarter, but the yards they allowed late in the fourth quarter are attributed to their prevent play calling. The defense played an excellent game.

The offense continued to struggle once it got into enemy territory, having to settle for three field goals early in the game. But Marshawn Lynch got going later. It had been a while since a Seattle receiver had an inhuman reception, but Doug Baldwin delivered late in the game to set up Beast Mode’s touchdown run.

Conference Championships

Denver Broncos (vs. New England)

The Broncos defense played a fantastic game. They ran a lot of prevent defense in the fourth quarter once they went up 23-3 and that accounts for New England’s late scoring. Rodgers-Cromartie had a great game and they held the Patriots to next to nothing on the ground.

The Broncos failed to score on the first drive of the game, they had done so in 11 of their first 17 games (9 TDs, 2 FGs). But even though they started their first three drives inside their own 20 they strung plays together into really nice scoring drives and won the field position battle. The running backs did a great job to run down the clock and eventually seal the game in the fourth quarter.

Seattle Seahawks (vs. San Francisco)

Seattle’s offensive line looked better than it had all season in pass protection, but the offense still had trouble getting any momentum against the 49ers’ defense. They had a few nice drives but most of their points came off turnovers and good field position.

As that implies, Seattle’s defense smothered San Francisco in almost every facet of the game. Kaepernick had his share of rushing yards as he has proven to be the most difficult mobile QB to contain in the NFL. But Seattle let him get his and focused on limiting the rest of SF’s offense, and they did just that and forced three turnovers in the final quarter of the game.

I will be watching the Pro Bowl tonight and I will publish something about it either late this evening or tomorrow.