SEATTLE — Even as Sam Darnold was helping the Seattle Seahawks win a franchise-record 14 games during the regular season on their way to the NFC’s No. 1 seed, questions persisted about his big-game ability and whether he could avoid the costly mistake.
Wonder no more.
In the biggest game of his eight-year NFL career, Darnold answered those questions in the most resounding way possible, throwing three touchdown passes with zero turnovers to power Seattle to a 31-27 win over the Los Angeles Rams in the NFC Championship Game on Sunday night at Lumen Field.
Indeed, Darnold can win the big game — even while playing at less than 100%, and even on a night when Seattle’s elite defense didn’t have its best stuff. Now the quarterback has his team in the biggest game of all, with the Seahawks set to play the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX on Feb. 8 at Levi’s Stadium.
“You can’t talk about the game without talking about our quarterback,” Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald said. “He shut a lot of people up tonight, so I’m really happy for him.”
Darnold was playing his second straight game with a left oblique injury he suffered in practice Jan. 15. When the Seahawks beat the San Francisco 49ers 41-6 in the divisional round two days later, he only had to attempt 17 passes before he was pulled with about nine minutes left and the game all but over.
The Seahawks needed much more from Darnold on Sunday night against a Rams defense that has been his nemesis, and their Pro Bowl quarterback delivered. He completed 25 of 36 attempts for 346 yards, playing aggressively without putting the ball in harm’s way. He has now gone three straight games without a turnover.
Darnold was particularly effectively in the deep passing game. Per ESPN Research, he completed seven attempts thrown 10-plus yards beyond the line of scrimmage, including five to Jaxon Smith-Njigba for 96 yards and a touchdown. Over the two regular-season meetings with the Rams, he had eight such completions with three interceptions. Those were among the six total interceptions he threw in those two games compared to two touchdown passes.
The Rams won the first meeting 21-19 at SoFi Stadium in Week 11. Seattle prevailed 38-37 in overtime at Lumen Field in Week 16. Darnold led the Seahawks to a win in Round 3 despite limited participation Wednesday, Thursday and Friday as he continued to manage his injured oblique. Darnold received a pain-killing injection pregame, as he did last week, sources told ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
“To come out [and play] the way he played, barely practicing, barely throwing the ball, it was really incredible,” said Macdonald, who is not given to hyperbole. “It should go down as one of the best performances in playoff history, I would imagine. It’s hard to stack it, but I can’t imagine anybody playing any better.”
Darnold, who secured another $500,000 in incentives with the win, said he “felt good” and that he wasn’t concerned about his lack of reps leading up to Sunday.
“I think middle of the season, Week 9 or 10, it might have been a bigger problem,” he said. “But with all the reps that we’ve accumulated throughout the season and throughout training camp, OTAs, all that stuff, I wasn’t really concerned about timing or anything like that on certain routes.”
Smith-Njigba, the NFL’s leading receiver during the regular season, led Seattle with 10 catches for 153 yards and gave Seattle a 17-13 second-quarter lead when he caught the first of Darnold’s three touchdown passes. The others went to former Ram Cooper Kupp — the MVP of Los Angeles’ Super Bowl LVI win — and reserve wideout Jake Bobo.
“I’m rolling with Sam all day,” Smith-Njigba said. “We believe in him. The building believes in him. The city believes in him. It’s awesome to run out onto the field with him.”
Kenneth Walker III stepped into a larger role in the wake of Zach Charbonnet‘s torn ACL last week, and Seattle’s new primary back stepped up again. After scoring three touchdowns in the divisional round, he scored Seattle’s first TD on Sunday and had 111 yards on a season-high 23 touches — eight more than he averaged during the regular season while sharing work with Charbonnet.
“He’s just worked, that’s all he’s done,” Macdonald said. “Now he has an opportunity to really carry the load and he’s doing a great job. We’re going to need him for one more game.”
Earlier this week, the Seahawks’ social media department posted a video with clips of Macdonald addressing the team for the first time in April 2024, three months after general manager John Schneider hired him to replace Pete Carroll. Macdonald told his players to imagine hosting the NFC Championship Game on a wet and windy day in Seattle, and about how they’d become “a team that won’t die, that won’t quit.”
He was prescient about everything but the weather.
The Seahawks fell behind 13-10 in the second quarter Sunday before answering with Darnold’s touchdown to Smith-Njigba. They led for much of the afternoon despite their top-ranked scoring defense again struggling to contain Puka Nacua, who went for 225 yards and two touchdowns in the Week 16 game.
Unlike that second meeting, the Seahawks couldn’t blame a short-handed secondary and a short week for their inability to slow the NFL’s second-leading receiver. Nacua caught nine passes for 165 yards and a touchdown, with 44 of those yards coming on a first-quarter catch over Devon Witherspoon.
Seattle’s Pro Bowl cornerback got beat for another big play by Davante Adams. But with the game on the line, he broke up Matthew Stafford‘s pass into the end zone to tight end Terrance Ferguson on fourth-and-goal from the 4 with just under 5 minutes remaining.
“That’s Devon Witherspoon,” Macdonald said. “That’s him. We actually didn’t even execute that play well on the fourth down, but he just covered his guy forever and just refused to let his guy catch the ball. That’s who he is. That’s who he is every day. … Incredibly proud of him.”
The Rams finished with 479 total yards.
Adams beat cornerback Riq Woolen for a 34-yard touchdown late in the third quarter that pulled the Rams to within four points. That was part of a disastrous sequence for Seattle’s fourth-year cornerback. He momentarily got Seattle’s defense off the field by breaking up Stafford’s pass on third down, only to get flagged for taunting as he jawed at the Rams’ sideline in celebration, giving them 15 yards and a fresh set of downs. Adams’ touchdown came on the next play.
“Riq’s done a tremendous job for us,” Macdonald said. “Yeah, you’re frustrated in the moment about what’s happening. But he just made an emotional decision. But we’ve got to pick him up. That’s not the time to get all upset. You’ve got to go play the next play. I know they scored the next play and you’ve got to go rebound and come back. Riq came back and played well the rest of the game.”
Darnold, signed by the Seahawks in March after they traded Geno Smith to the Las Vegas Raiders, became the first player in NFL history to win at least 14 games in consecutive seasons with different teams. He made his second straight Pro Bowl despite leading all players with 20 turnovers during the regular season.
That included four interceptions in the Seahawks’ loss to the Rams in Week 11, after Darnold ranked first in Total QBR over the first 10 weeks of the season. After that game, linebacker Ernest Jones IV passionately defended the quarterback, saying Darnold had been “balling” and that he shouldn’t be defined by one bad performance.
“Everything that I said, I stood on it,” Jones said Sunday while holding a victory cigar in his right hand. “Sam’s a baller, like I said. Doubt Sam if you want to. Sam’s going to show up every time. That’s what we’ve known, and that’s why I stood on that knife for him and I’ll do it all over again.”
The Seahawks will play in the Super Bowl for the fourth time in franchise’s 50-year history, and they’ll get a rematch of their loss to the Patriots in Super Bowl XLIX, when Malcolm Butler intercepted Russell Wilson at the goal line to end Seattle’s hopes of winning back-to-back titles.
Darnold has his own history with the Patriots. With the New York Jets in 2019, his second NFL season, the mic’d up quarterback was heard telling coaches he was “seeing ghosts” during a 33-0 loss to New England on “Monday Night Football.”
“I almost forgot about it, so thanks,” Darnold said with a laugh when the moment was brought up postgame Sunday. “No, you’re good. I think for me, there was a lot that I didn’t know back then, so I’m just going to continue to learn and grow in this great game. There is a lot of stuff that I can get better from today even. I feel like I missed some throws out there that I shouldn’t miss. There were some things offensively that I feel like we can do better. So we’re always looking to get better. I’m always looking to get better. That’s the great part about this game is you win an NFC Championship and you win games throughout the season, but there is always ways that you can look to get better.”
As the understated Darnold spoke humbly about the way he played against the Rams, his teammates and coach were happy to revel in his narrative-busting performance.
“Everyone wants to make a narrative about this guy, but he’s been the same guy since he walked in the door,” Macdonald said. “You don’t want me writing the stories because I would not write the narratives that are out there. It’d be really boring. It would be like, this guy’s the man and his teammates love him and he’s competitive as crap and he’s tough and he’s really talented, and he’s a winner. That would be the story.”
