The Seattle Seahawks find themselves at the pool, standing at the end of the springboard and staring down at the water. A line of other divers waits impatiently behind them.
They have two possible outcomes. They can either springboard themselves into the air so they can land in the water with a big splash. Or they can slip off the edge of the board and fall flat on their faces.
If the Seahawks want to remain relevant in the second half of the NFL season, now is the time they must spring themselves upward and avoid doing a belly flop.
Somehow in this topsy-turvy Seahawks season that’s gone up and down more frequently than the Space Needle elevators, Seattle has been done a huge favor by the schedule makers. The Seahawks, having stopped the first-half bleeding to reach .500, are looking at three straight home games following an extra week of recovery from the bye week.
If ever there was a time for the Seahawks to make a move, that time is now.
It’s almost as if the schedule makers peered into the future, predicted Seattle’s sluggish start, then set the tables for a midseason revival. Not only did the Seahawks receive a convenient time for their bye week, this stretch means they don’t have to set foot on a plane for a game for more than a month. Seattle will have much to be thankful for when it’s time for gratitude at Thanksgiving dinner.
The schedule makers even saw fit to give the Seahawks the exact opponent they need at the start of this stretch, the Arizona Cardinals. Arizona currently holds a two-game lead over Seattle in the NFC West standings. A win Sunday at CenturyLink Field — which is not only a home game but a primetime game, in which the Seahawks are 15-2 since Pete Carroll took over as coach in 2010 — gets Seattle right back in the fray.
And after that the opponents get easier the remainder of the homestand. First it’s a rematch with the struggling San Francisco 49ers, a team the Seahawks already beat convincingly on the road three weeks ago. Then it’s a visit by the Pittsburgh Steelers, who have the pedigree but perhaps not the skill-position players, as top running back Le’Veon Bell is out injured and No. 1 quarterback Ben Roethlisberger may be as well. It’s a far cry from the Murderers’ Row Seattle faced in the first half of the season, which included games against division leaders in Green Bay, Cincinnati and Carolina, two of those coming on the road.
The Seahawks themselves refuse to acknowledge how crucial this stretch is to their season. To a man, Seattle’s coaches and players this week played down the importance of these games, and Sunday’s game against Arizona in particular. The usual cliches about playing one game at a time, how every game matters and how every game in the NFL is difficult, might as well have been read from a script provided by the front office.
“We’ve seen some first-place teams this year,” Seattle coach Pete Carroll said with a wry grin when asked about the importance of the game against the Cardinals. “We’ve been getting our fill of that.
“I’m sure this an exciting matchup looking from the outside in,” Carroll continued. “It’s a big opportunity, as every week is. We’re going to try and play a terrific football game, just like we would no matter what’s going on.”
But it’s impossible to look at Sunday’s game at CenturyLink Field and not recognize its significance to the Seahawks. While it would be wrong to describe Sunday’s game as Seattle’s Super Bowl, considering the Seahawks have been to the past two, it certainly could be this season’s make-or-break contest. A loss would drop the Seahawks three games behind Arizona with seven remaining, which would all but knock Seattle out of contention for the division title. According to ESPN.com, Seattle’s odds of winning the division drop to 2 percent with a loss Sunday.
However, a win Sunday, followed by two more wins at home, and who knows? The Seahawks would be 7-4 and may even find themselves atop the NFC West and in control of their own destiny. That’s the opportunity this favorable stretch presents Seattle.
The Seahawks better take advantage of this. All it takes is a single loss during this stretch to put Seattle on the brink. A loss to Arizona Sunday would not only sound the death knell of the Seahawks’ division-title hopes, it would likely put Seattle in a position where it needed to win out just to earn a wild-card spot. The past two seasons it required 11 wins to earn a wild card spot in the NFC. Each of the past three seasons there were NFC teams that finished 10-6 and missed out on the postseason. Therefore a loss Sunday, which would drop the Seahawks to 4-5, probably means Seattle needs to win its final seven games to make the playoffs.
Sure, the Seahawks can pay lip service to there being no extra urgency during this home stretch, and Sunday’s game in particular.
“I don’t’ think our urgency changes at all,” Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson said. “It can’t change. Ultimately, when you focus on just trying to be at your best and just trying to find ways to win and continually win one game at a time, you don’t change your urgency. I think that kind of messes with you a little bit. I think for us we’re just focusing on playing our best football on Sunday.”
But we all know better. This is sink-or-swim time for the Seahawks, and how Seattle dismounts the springboard will determine whether there’s meaningful December football for the Seahawks this year.
Check out Nick Patterson’s Seattle Sidelines blog at http://www.heraldnet.com/seattlesidelines, and follow him on Twitter at @NickHPatterson.
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