Seahawks rally, stun Rams in OT for instant classic
Published 9:30 am Friday, December 19, 2025
SEATTLE — Sam Darnold raised his right arm and pointed to the black, Pacific Northwest winter sky. Eric Saubert held the ball triumphantly above his head, something a career blocking tight end rarely does.
These Seahawks are far from perfect.
They have a quarterback who leads the league in turnovers, with two more interceptions in the biggest game of the season. Their vaunted, previously dominant defense got dominated by the Los Angeles Rams Thursday night.
But, man, they’ve got grit. And luck.
And the NFC West lead.
Puka Nacua ended a wondrous night — and wild week, after publicly ripping NFL game officials during an online livestream — by again running free through the middle of Seattle’s defense for a 41-yard touchdown catch and run from Matthew Stafford in overtime. That gave the Rams a 37-30 lead with 6:27 left in OT. Nacua had 12 catches for 225 yards, the most by an opponent against the Seahawks in eight years.
Seattle’s offense got its chance to respond, by league overtime rules.
Former Rams Super Bowl MVP Cooper Kupp made his best, and biggest, catch as a Seahawk, leaping along the right sideline and getting both feet down in bounds for a 21-yard gain to get the Seahawks into the red zone. On third down, Zach Charbonnet ran for a first down to the 4-yard line. Darnold then threw a 4-yard touchdown pass to Jaxon Smith-Njigba across the back of the end zone.
Coach Mike Macdonald signaled two fingers from the sideline, to go for two points. A tie would not give the Seahawks the NFC West title if they finish the regular season with the same record as L.A.
After each team called timeout to re-prepare, Darnold and offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak sent receivers Kupp, Smith-Njigba and tight end A.J. Barner outside the right. Saubert was tight at left end. The ninth-year veteran on his eighth team, cut this season then recently re-signed, blocked. He blocked again. Then Saubert slipped out into a late pass pattern just inside the goal line.
The Rams defense never saw him.
Afforded time to wait by his offensive line, Darnold aimed almost a dart throw 5 yards to the wide-open Saubert. He caught it. The entire Seahawks team ran off the sideline and mobbed Saubert in the back of the end zone, and pushed him to the end of the lower south stands.
Lumen Field shook.
Darnold, who earlier had thrown two interceptions to seemingly bury the Seahawks in a 30-14 hole, celebrated his greatest comeback yet for Seattle.
Seahawks 38, Rams 37. The game of the year in the NFL so far. One of the best — and most meaningful — regular-season games in Seattle’s 50 years of NFL football.
With one of the most unlikely heroes: Saubert. He has just three touchdown catches in 110 regular-season games spanning nine years for the Falcons, Bears, Jaguars, Broncos, Cowboys, Texans, 49ers and now Seahawks.
In a decade in the league, he’s caught NFL passes in an end zone about as much as you have.
“I knew I was late in the progression,” Saubert said, after getting a game ball in the locker room from coach Mike Macdonald. “Sam is amazing at going through his progression. He found me late.
“And I kind of blacked out after that, so I can’t tell you anymore.”
How preposterous was this Seahawks victory?
NFL senior researcher Dante Koplowitz-Fleming noted following the game that teams had been 79-0 in the league since 1975 when having over 400 yards of offense, zero giveaways, zero sacks allowed and three or more takeaways.
Los Angeles had all that Thursday night — and still lost.
“We never think we are going to lose a game,” Seahawks running back Kenneth Walker (11 carries, 100 yards, with a 55-yard touchdown) said after his second 100-yard rushing game this season, and first since week two in September.
“It was crazy.”
The Seahawks (12-3) and Macdonald’s previously dominant defense allowed quarterback Matthew Stafford’s and coach Sean McVay’s Rams offense 581 yards. Stafford completed 29 of 49 passes for 457 yards and three touchdowns.
Yet the Seahawks avenged their 21-19 loss to the Rams (11-4) last month in California. They clinched their first playoff appearance in three years. They now have the inside track to their first NFC West title since 2020 — and to the top seed in the conference playoffs, with the only bye and home-field advantage that comes with it.
Seattle ends its regular season at Carolina (7-7) and at San Francisco (10-4).
“Holy smokes!” Macdonald said, still almost out of breath 30-plus minutes after the game ended.
“What a great football game. First of all, an incredibly electric atmosphere. An all-time great atmosphere. …
“With all the adversity we were dealing with throughout the game…it was awesome. Just so proud of our group.
“I mean, this is who we are. We set out to prove to ourselves who we were as a team.
“I’ll tell what, the resiliency of this team is there. The relentlessness is there. They have each others’ backs.” Seattle’s comeback
Down 30-14 with 9 minutes left after Darnold’s second interception right at a Ram, that Macdonald defense L.A. had steam-rolled all night suddenly stood up with three consecutive three-and-out stops. Rashid Shaheed ran back a punt 58 yards for a touchdown.
“He changed the game,” Smith-Njigba (eight catches, 96 yards, Seahawks record with his 101st catch this season) said of Shaheed, acquired in a midseason trade from New Orleans.
A two-point conversion closed Seattle to within 30-22.
Then Shaheed ran 31 yards on an end-around to start another march. Darnold found tight end A.J. Barner alone on the right side in the end zone for a leaping, 26-yard touchdown. Seattle trailed 30-28.
Rams linebacker Jared Verse batted down Darnold’s 2-point throw to the ground. Incomplete, right? Seahawks still down, by 2, with 6 1/2 minutes left.
But as the teams lined up for the ensuing kickoff, replay officials at NFL headquarters in New York buzzed referee Brad Allen. All scoring plays, including 2-point conversions, automatically get reviewed by New York.
The replay guys saw Darnold’s throw was backwards, not an incomplete pass but a fumble. Seahawks running back Zach Charbonnet had idly picked up the lonely ball in the end zone as an afterthought after the supposed incomplete pass. Because that was a clear, albeit accidental, recovery of a fumble in the end zone, it was two points to Seattle and, incredibly, a tie game at 30.
“You’re lined up to kickoff and then they say it’s a fumble because they had the clear and obvious recovery. Now you tack it on, make it a 30-30 game. Very interesting,” Rams coach Sean McVay said. “Didn’t get a clear explanation of everything that went on, just because of some of the timing of it.
“I’ve never seen anything or never been a part of anything like that. I’ve grown up around this game.”
That wild reversal led to overtime.
Sam Darnold’s interceptions
Darnold paced the Seahawks sideline. He looked to his right.
No answers there.
The quarterback looked up at the giant video board behind the south end zone of hushed Lumen Field.
No answers there, either.
Darnold put both hands into his hand-warming pouch tied around his waist. Teammate Brady Russell tapped the QB on his shoulder pad.
The NFL’s leader with 18 turnovers had just thrown his second interception of this NFC West showdown, directly to a defender who had fooled him. It was his fifth in two games over the last month against L.A.
But then Walker’s startling, 55-yard touchdown run, and Shaheed’s 58-yard punt return through a weakness Seahawks special-teams coach Jay Harbaugh had scouted in that side of the Rams’ punt coverage for another touchdown with 8 minutes left, erased Darnold’s mistakes.
They were glaring.
On a third and 8 at midfield in the third quarter with Seattle trailing 16-14, the Rams were in man-to-man coverage on the left side. Shaheed was lined up outside wide left and Kupp inside him in the left slot both ran slant routes. Rams extra cornerback Josh Wallace was lined up on Kupp.
Wallace didn’t move at all inside with Kupp’s slant route. He stayed stationary, in the path of Shaheed’s slant pattern from outside him.
Darnold obviously didn’t expect Wallace to do that. He threw the ball right to him.
The Rams returned it 56 yards. Walker saved his teammate Darnold from a pick-six touchdown with a hustle tackle at the 1-yard line. It was Darnold’s NFL-leading 17th turnover this season, and fifth in two games this season against L.A.
On the next play, the Rams’ Blake Corum ran that remaining 1 yard for the TD. Instead of the Seahawks in position for at least a go-ahead field goal, they trailed 23-14.
They were chasing the game the rest of the night. That’s a bad recipe to beat these Rams. Yet the Seahawks did.
The rockin’ crowd at Lumen Field was silenced. Like, what-just-happened quiet.
From there, the Rams kept ripping off big plays down the middle of Seattle’s defense, with coverage nowhere near. Stafford threw to Nacua for 58 yards on a catch and run down the middle to end the third quarter, to the Seattle 4. Two plays later, key Seahawks safety Coby Bryant limped off with an injured leg.
On the next play, Stafford showed off with a lightning-quick, no-look pass to Nacua, who got free off the snap from the right slot. The 1-yard touchdown pass put the Seahawks down 30-14. Kenneth Walker’s contract run
Walker’s rookie contract expires with the end of this season. He’s spent all season in a job share with Charbonnet. Part of that was to pace Walker through all 17 games without injury, or re-injuring a sore foot.
The Seahawks came out running to begin the second half. Barner lunged into the line for a first down on a direct-snap “Tush Push” run on a third and 1, Walker took a handoff on a run designed to go left. He cut hard right immediately, and ran past a peel-back block into the backfield by right tackle Abe Lucas.
Walker then out-ran every Ram down the right sideline for a starting, 55-yard touchdown. His longest run since week 17 of his 2022 rookie season with Seattle put the Seahawks ahead 14-13 in a game they’d been mostly dominated to that point.
Playing not to lose to end half
The Seahawks played not to lose in their curious final possession of the first half.
The Rams kept hitting on big pass plays over the middle of Seattle’s zone defense, behind middle linebacker Ernest Jones and in front of Seahawks safeties. Seattle’s pass rush didn’t come close to affecting Stafford all half. His easy pitch and catch touchdown pass of 3 yards to tight end Terrance Ferguson gave L.A. a 13-7 lead with 3:43 left in the half. At that point, the Rams had rolled up 252 yards on Seattle’s defense.
Macdonald and offensive play caller Kubiak played the ensuing drive preoccupied with not giving the ball back to Sean McVay’s Rams offense to gain more yards and points before halftime. The Seahawks were receiving the second-half kickoff.
So Seattle ran. The drive began with Charbonnet, not lead back Walker, running — for 2 yards. L.A. defensive lineman Kobie Turner then soundly beat Seahawks rookie Grey Zabel at the snap to sack Darnold. It was the second sack Zabel allowed in two games, after no sacks allowed the first three months of the first-round draft choice’s debut season.
On third and 16, boos filled the stadium as Walker took a handoff on an inside-zone running play, a white-flag surrender call by Kubiak. Those boos turned to roars when Walker broke three tackles and dragged a defender the final yards for a 17-yard gain and first down at the 2-minute warning.
From there, four more runs in a row by the Seahawks to burn the clock. Seattle got a gift first down on second and 10 on a Rams penalty for defensive holding. From the Rams 34 with 50 seconds left in the half, Darnold finally threw the ball down the field for the first time. Kupp caught the pass down the seam on the run, sprinting with the ball into the red zone. Los Angeles safety Kam Curl ran across the field and hit Kupp with his shoulder pad on the ball to force a fumble at the L.A. 17. The ball bounded foreward behind Kupp’s momentum all the way to the goal line, where the Rams recovered for a touchback.
The Seahawks played the clock first, with scoring a secondary concern. And they got nothing. The half ended with Seattle still down 13-7.
Smith-Njigba had one target, a third-down pass broken up, and zero catches in the half. Kupp had two catches for 18 yards.
The Seahawks’ lone big play of the half set up their only points. On their first possession, Darnold threw a throw-back screen pass to Walker. He raced with the ball 46 yards behind Zabel running with him, all the way to the Rams 5-yard line. Charbonnet then ran 4 yards behind Zabel’s pancake block of Turner for Charbonnet’s career-high ninth touchdown this season and the game’s first points.
From there, the Rams offense shredded Seattle like no other had this season.
Battered secondary
After Bryant went out and Ty Okada replaced him, the Seahawks lost Nick Emmanwori on the final defensive drive of regulation. The do-it-all rookie went into the locker room getting evaluated for a concussion.
Then cornerback Riq Woolen left the game late with a knee injury.
That limited Macdonald’s ability in the crux of the game to disguise and move around his defensive backs, as he loves to do to challenge quarterbacks and play callers.
