SEATTLE — Home…sweet home?
The Seahawks had lost seven of their previous eight games at Lumen Field. It had been a point of emphasis all spring into summer, pushing fall: Start fast and play better at home.
Sunday, so much went so right so quickly for Seattle at home against New Orleans, you half-expected Marshawn Lynch to come out of retirement to run a Beast Quake II for a touchdown.
During a timeout in the first quarter Sunday, with the Seahawks already leading 14-0, the stadium’s big video board showed Lynch’s Beast Quake touchdown that famously rocked the Saints and Lumen Field in a January 2011 playoff game.
On the next play after that timeout, Kenneth Walker scored a touchdown on a 3-yard run. Seattle led 21-0 not even 11 minutes into this game.
It was 35-3 midway through the second quarter.
It was the kind of dominant performance at home this team hasn’t had in years.
Walker’s two rushing touchdowns, rookie Tory Horton’s two first-half TDs, including the longest punt return in team history, plus Sam Darnold’s two touchdown passes in the first quarter and a half led the Seahawks to a 44-13 cruise past New Orleans Sunday at rainy-then-absolutely-sunny Lumen Field.
They’ve been wanting to simply win at home. They produced the largest margin of victory at Lumen Field in five years, since a 40-3 win over the New York Jets in Seattle on Dec. 13, 2020. Zero fans were in attendance for that; it was during the COVID-19 pandemic and its restrictions.
Sunday, more than 68,500 fans frolicked in the fun of Horton’s 95-yard punt return. And so much more.
Darnold completed 10 of his first 11 passes for 169 yards and two touchdowns for a perfect passer rating of 158.3 in the first half. It was 38-3 Seahawks.
Sunday’s was the second-highest-scoring first half in Seattle history. The Seahawks scored 45 in the first half against Minnesota ON Sept. 29, 2002, in a 48-23 win.
Seattle entered the day averaging 8.5 points per first half this season. The Seahawks averaged 11.1 points per first half last season, and 10.5 points per first half in 2023. Sunday, they had 35 points with 7 minutes still left in the second quarter. At that point, they’d run only 14 plays on offense.
The scoreboard replay of Lynch’s Beast Quake run, then Walker’s touchdown run came after Seattle’s D’Anthony Bell blocked a Saints punt with 5 minutes left in the first quarter. That ended the NFL’s second-longest streak since 1950 of not having a punt blocked, 233 games by New Orleans, since 2011 to Sunday.
Darnold yielded to backup Drew Lock with 12:45 left in the fourth quarter, with Seattle’s starters already turning attention to playing at division-rival Arizona in four days, Thursday night. Darnold finished 14 for 18 passing for 218 yards and touchdown passes to Horton and to Jaxon Smith-Njigba. Darnold’s passing rating was a perfect 158.3 into the third quarter. He finished at 154.2.
It was the second-highest rating for a game of Darnold’s seven-year career. He had a 157.9 rating last Dec. 8 for the Vikings against the Falcons (22 for 28, 347 yards, five touchdowns, zero interceptions that day).
Darnold had his first turnover-free game as Seattle’s quarterback Sunday.
Smith-Njigba was sick Saturday, and the Seahawks added him to the game’s injury list as questionable. Then the NFL’s second-leading receiver in catches and yards entering week three had five more receptions for 96 yards. He finished 4 yards shy of joining former teammate DK Metcalf as the only Seahawks with three consecutive 100-yard receiving games to begin a season.
New offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak got scrutinized after Seattle’s opening-week loss to San Francisco on this same field for calling just two play-action passes. It’s a specialty of Darnold’s, one of the attractions to the Seahawks signing him this spring.
Sunday, the avalanche of Seahawks points began with a play-action pass that showed the effect it — and Seattle’s running game — can have on a defense.
Kubiak began the game running Walker three times on Seattle’s first four plays. Then from the 12-yard line the play caller had Darnold fake a handoff to Walker. Saints safety Justin Reid fell hard for the fake, running into the line. That left the middle and outside zones of New Orleans’ zone pass coverage with a gaping hole.
Kubiak sent three receivers into that area. The Saints covered Cooper Kupp in the end zone. No one covered Smith-Njigba running an outside route a few yards in front of Kupp. The wide receiver who was ill Saturday and questionable to play caught Darnold’s easy pitch for a 12-yard touchdown.
Smith-Njigba had four catches on four targets for 94 yards in the first half.
Jay Harbaugh Day
Special-teams coach Jay Harbaugh is going to be a star of Seahawks film review Monday. And they only have to watch half the game.
Harbaugh’s units in the first half did this:
Horton’s record-setting punt return, on which the rookie ran all 95 yards untouched. He was looking at the giant video board during his run to see himself in the clear from all Saints.
It was Seattle’s first punt return for a touchdown in 10 years, since Tyler Lockett ran one back 57 yards against the Rams on Sept. 13, 2015. That was so long ago, the Rams were in St. Louis then.
Bell’s blocked punt was the first of his four-year NFL career.
After New Orleans got its first points with a field goal to shave a bit of Seattle’s lead to 21-3 in the second quarter, wide receiver Dareke Young returned the Saints kickoff 60 yards. The Seahawks turned that drive start at the New Orleans 38 into a 28-3 lead. Horton got his second touchdown of the half, on a 14-yard pass from Darnold.
Josh Jobe, continued
Missing Pro Bowl cornerback Devon Witherspoon, Pro Bowl safety Julian Love and versatile rookie safety Nick Emmanwori, the Seahawks secondary and defense excelled anyway.
Josh Jobe continued his impressive play in Witherspoon’s absence. Jobe made an immediate tackle of New Orleans’ Chris Olave after a catch to the sideline short of the line to gain the red zone on a second down in the second quarter. On the third down, Jobe knocked away Rattler’s pass from Olave on a slant route in the middle of the end zone.
It was a four-point play. Instead of the touchdown, the Saints’ 16-play drive ended in a short field goal. Seattle still led 21-3.
Jobe intercepted Rattler’s pass deep to Olave late in the first quarter. But the deep side official penalized Jobe for illegal contact on Olave, jamming him on his cut out and up early in the play. Derion Kendrick, signed last month after the Los Angeles Rams released him, was again the primary fifth, nickel defensive back. He was that when Witherspoon’s bruised knee caused him to miss Seattle’s win at Pittsburgh. Kendrick, a former Rams starter who lost last season to a knee injury, had his second interception in two games. He made a diving catch of a pass by Rattler in the fourth quarter.
Jalen Milroe cameo
Rookie third-string quarterback Jalen Milroe ran his second career NFL play. It was a 3-yard run off a direct snap to him on the opening drive after halftime.
Unlike on the third-round pick’s first pro play, a 1-yard run in short yardage early in the opener against San Francisco, Milroe and Darnold were on the field for the rookie QB’s run Sunday.
Arizona now has to spend the relatively fewer hours the Cardinals have between now and Thursday night’s game with the Seahawks in Glendale studying and planning for that.
Another Byron Murphy sack
Defensive tackle Byron Murphy sacked Rattler to end New Orleans’ first possession of the second half, to keep Seattle’s lead at 41-6.
At that point Murphy had 2 1/2 sacks in seven quarters of play. He had a sack of the Steelers’ Aaron Rodgers plus shared a second one with Leonard Williams the previous game, at Pittsburgh. The first-round draft choice from Texas in 2024 had just 1/2 sack all his rookie season. He only played 49% of Seattle’s defensive snaps last season.
He’s playing more, and producing more, so far this season. Coach Mike Macdonald has been keeping him in more in passing situations.
Murphy has worked extensively with Williams, the 11th-year veteran and Pro Bowl defensive end, on recognizing pass hints in how offensive linemen set up to block, and adjusting his feet into more pass-rushing stances.
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