SEATTLE — Seattle Seahawks cornerback Jeremy Lane never felt so good while feeling so bad.
“All my injuries that I had, I felt from last year,” Lane said after helping the Seahawks beat Pittsburgh 39-30 in an NFL game Sunday at CenturyLink Field.
“My groin injury. My arm was hurting. My knee was hurting. My right hamstring was hurting,” Lane said. “Man, I was just hurting out there.”
“I played more than what I thought I was going to play, but I made it through.”
Lane was in uniform for the first time this season after suffering a gruesome arm injury in the Super Bowl in February.
He was expecting to play almost exclusively on special teams, and he made a huge play in that part of the game early when the Steelers attempted a fake punt on the first play of the second quarter.
Lane intercepted the pass from backup quarterback Landry Jones and returned it 54 yards to the Pittsburgh 24-yard line. Six plays later the Seahawks scored their first touchdown of the game.
Two things happened during the return that were memorable. One was that Lane ran out of gas and fell down without being tackled. The other is that he had a flashback to the arm injury in the Super Bowl, which happened on an interception return.
“Of course, yeah, I did,” Lane said when asked about thinking back to that. “It was such a relief. It was a real flashback, but the good part is I didn’t get hurt this time.”
That wasn’t the end for Lane, however, as he was pressed into duty on defense when Marcus Burley left the game in the third quarter with an ankle injury.
Lane played the rest of the game as the nickel defensive back and generally held up well against Pittsburgh’s high-flying passing attack.
“He didn’t expect to play this kind of minutes in this game, so you have to give him a little leeway on that,” Seattle cornerback Richard Sherman said. “It was hard on him, but we had injuries so he had to step in there. But he played, and he played a heck of a game.”
Lane bears a ghastly scar on his left forearm as a reminder of the surgery that was required to repair shattered bones, and he said it was like a dream to come running out of the tunnel before the game.
“It was emotional for me. I’m surprised I didn’t cry,” he said. “It felt good, though. I couldn’t wait to get out on the field.”
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