Leave it to the Arizona Cardinals to spoil the Seattle Seahawks’ bid for playoff positioning. This past Saturday, the Seahawks missed out on securing a first-round bye when they lost a heartbreaker to their bitter NFC West rivals, 34-31.
Seattle squandered a stunning performance from Russell Wilson, who finished with 350 passing yards and four touchdowns against Arizona. Wilson even went 13-of-16 through the air for 187 yards and three of his scores in the fourth quarter alone in trying to fend off the pesky Cards, only to have kicker Steven Hauschka miss the point-after try for the supposed one-point lead with less than a minute left in the game.
Not only was Seattle done in by its own kicker, but its defense also uncharacteristically caved in late in the contest having surrendered three TDs to the Cardinals in the final quarter just the same. To literally add injury to the insulting loss, key wideout Tyler Lockett suffered a nasty ankle injury during the contest as well, which could have the team’s offense on the fritz for the season finale.
Nevertheless, the Seahawks are obviously glad that their two meetings against Arizona are well behind them, and that another opportune matchup against the Niners will cap off their regular season. Despite the poor showing by the defense on Saturday, that unit remains the second-best scoring defense in the league at just 17.9 points allowed per game and will once again face San Francisco’s league-worst passing offense.
Not only that, but the Seahawks have won six-straight against the Niners (SU/ATS) since the start of the 2014 season, which means that they’ll pretty much secure the NFC’s No. 2 seed with little to no effort when all is said and done on New Year’s Day.
Like the no-longer-winless Cleveland Browns, the San Francisco 49ers got a present from the football gods on Saturday by way of a rare victory. The 49ers squeaked past the Los Angeles Rams, 22-21, to snap their 13-game losing streak and not end up in a tie with the infamous Browns for the worst record in the NFL.
All things considered from Saturday’s game, though, the Niners still appear as dysfunctional as they have been through the entire season. In spite of Colin Kaepernick’s late-game heroics his ballsy rushing two-point conversion for the win, he still finished a middling 257-passing yard day with two touchdowns and one pick.
San Fran also suffered a huge blow when lead running back Carlos Hyde tore his MCL during the contest. Hyde only tallied 38 rushing yards during Saturday’s match, and he’s the bread-and-butter of the team’s lackluster offense that ranks fourth in the league at nearly 130 rushing yards per contest.
The defense, meanwhile, came up huge in Week 16 with two interceptions off of Los Angeles’ rookie QB Jared Goff. Still, the Rams are no Seahawks for sure, and the NFL’s worst scoring defense (30.3 points allowed per game) will be in for a long afternoon this coming Sunday as it will try to contain a bitter Seattle team still on the hunt for a first-round bye.
Not only will the Niners see a spike in competition in their regular-season finale, they’ll even be challenged by putting a good show in front of their fans in Levi’s Stadium, where they’ve lost six straight games (SU/ATS). That being said, expect the Bay Area faithful to be in for a major letdown after a monumental victory of sorts from the penultimate regular-season game against the Rams.
Writer’s Prediction
The Seahawks (-9.5) cruise to a 29-13 victory to lock up a first-round bye in the playoffs.
