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| Jermaine Kearse spun out of four tackles on his way to a touchdown in the third quarter of Seattle's dominating Super Bowl XLVIII victory. |
Cory Puffett
We are two days removed from Super Bowl Sunday and I am
still struggling to understand how
Seattle dominated this game so thoroughly. The Broncos took away the Beast,
Marshawn Lynch. Denver was penalized five fewer times for 60 fewer yards.
The Seattle Seahawks are Super Bowl championships, though. They
dominated in all facets of the game.
Marshawn Lynch and Robert Turbin combined for just 64 yards
on 24 carries. But Seattle still outgained Denver by more than 100 yards on the
ground because Russell Wilson and Percy Harvin combined for 71 yards on just
five carries.
Russell Wilson only attempted 25 passes. Peyton Manning completed 34. But Wilson connected on
72-percent of his attempts for 206 yards and a pair of touchdowns.
Percy Harvin was electric on special teams, but Seattle
stuck with what got them here in the passing game. Doug Baldwin and Jermaine
Kearse combined for 131 yards and two touchdowns on nine receptions. Almost as
impressive, those nine catches came on just ten targets.
The Seahawks’ defense only sacked Peyton Manning once, and
it only went for a one-yard loss. But the veteran quarterback was hurried often
and even scrambled from the pocket at times, which is very atypical.
That pressure from Seattle’s defensive line forced two
interceptions. One was returned for a touchdown by Malcolm Smith, who won Super
Bowl MVP honors for that, his fumble recovery, a pass deflection and 10
tackles.
Demaryius Thomas had 13 grabs on 18 targets for 118 yards
and a touchdown. But most of his yards were after the catch because Seattle
gave no room for Denver’s receivers to run downfield. Quite a few of those
yards also came on a catch and run that ended in a fumble forced by Byron
Maxwell.
Percy Harvin had just one kick return for 52 yards all
season entering Sunday. He took his only kick return of Super Bowl XLVIII 87
yards to the house. Jon Ryan punted only once, and it was a booming 45-yarder.
Britton Colquitt punted twice for Denver and his longest was just 31 yards.
We can talk about whether or not this loss affects Peyton
Manning’s legacy. We can talk about what this loss means for Denver, who may
lose key offensive pieces like Knowshon Moreno and Eric Decker to free agency
this offseason.
But this is the Super Bowl, and when a team wins this game
they deserve to have the focus placed on them. The Seattle Seahawks are world
champions for the first time in franchise history and they beat a former AFC
West rival to capture it. This is the city’s first championship since the
SuperSonics beat the Washington Bullets in the 1979 NBA Finals.
Let’s talk about how, for the fourth time in five tries, the
league’s leading offense failed to beat the league’s leading defense when the
two teams met on this stage. This was the first time such a matchup occurred
since 1991. NFL rules were supposed to favor offense much more than it did
then. But Seattle’s defense still dominated Denver’s record-setting offense.
And how about Seattle’s own offense? They did pretty damn
well for themselves. How does 6.2 yards per play sound? They picked up 2.2 more
yards per pass attempt than Denver and 2.8 more yards per rush. They ran nine
fewer plays than Denver but still outgained them by 35 total yards on offense.
Don’t forget the new storyline that most analysts didn’t
even think about before the game. Is this a Dynasty? Will the Seahawks be to
the 2010s what the New England Patriots were to the 2000s? They certainly could
be in the short term, though it will be difficult to keep a lot of their pieces
once their rookie contracts are up.
Remember that this was the youngest team in the NFL this
season at 26 years and some change on average. Seattle is the fourth youngest
victor in Super Bowl history.
This was one of the most dominating performances in Super
Bowl history and the first true blowout since Jon Gruden’s Buccaneers
dismantled the Oakland Raiders more than ten years ago. The fan in me aches for
Peyton Manning. I know he wanted this championship and I wanted it for him.
But I pride myself on being able to set aside my fanaticism
about Peyton Manning and the Washington Redskins when the time is right. And
right now I am just glad I got to witness such a great moment in NFL history.
In 1987, the Washington Redskins crushed the Denver Broncos.
It was the biggest blowout in Super Bowl history until two years later when the
San Francisco 49ers obliterated almost the same Broncos team. 26 years removed,
nobody remembers that the Redskins and Broncos offenses were almost identical
in every way. They don’t remember that Denver’s defense was supposed to be vastly
superior to Washington’s. We just remember that Denver blew a 10-point lead and
lost 42-10.
We may not think so now, but by the time Super Bowl LX (60)
rolls around many of us will have forgotten that Denver’s offense wasn’t just
great, it was historically great. We won’t even remember how the NFL dodged a
bullet with the weather. But we will always remember the way Seattle dominated
every aspect of the game and walked away with the city’s first championship.
Final Score:
Seattle Seahawks – 43
Denver Broncos – 8
MVP: LB Malcolm Smith (10 Tack, FR, INT, TD)
