NASHVILLE, Tenn. – The Seahawks will take home the gifts they wanted from their trip to Nashville – a victory to get back on the winning track after the rough loss a week ago in Los Angeles and one big record for receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba.
But they headed home with more of a hangover feeling than they anticipated.
And not from late nights on the streets of one of the biggest party cites in the world.
The Seahawks twice took leads of 20 points in the third quarter, and had to hang on to make sure an onside kick from the Titans (1-10) with 43 seconds remaining didn’t fall in to the wrong hands to preserve a 30-24 win.
It left some of them feeling a little queasy.
“I don’t think we played to our standards,” cornerback Devon Witherspoon said after a game that figures to mostly be remembered for Smith-Njigba breaking DK Metcalf’s single-season receiving yardage record. “We could have played a lot better on both sides of the ball. But this is a great win and it’s great to learn from a win instead of a loss. So we’ve just got to go back to the drawing board and see what we did wrong and try to improve on it.”
To be fair to the Seahawks, they were dealing with some unique challenges as the game wore on.
They entered the game without starting middle linebacker Ernest Jones IV, meaning Patrick O’Connell had to see his first significant defensive playing time.
Safety Ty Okada – already filling in for the injured Julian Love – left in the second quarter, meaning D’Anthony Bell had his most significant playing time of the season.
The Titans scored on a 1-yard pass from rookie Cameron Ward, the former WSU standout, to Chimere Dike with 43 seconds left, converting three fourth downs on a 15-play drive.
That drive came after the Seahawks went three-and-out on their previous possession.
As coach Mike Macdonald noted later, the Seahawks were content to force the Titans to have to take a lot of time off the clock.
“You would have liked for us to be able to close the game out earlier,” Macdonald said. “But they were fighting hard and they played hard. … The last drive, we were also playing the clock knowing they were going to be in an onside kick situation, so (we) didn’t give up a big play there, which is a positive.”
For one brief, ominous moment, the Titans thought they had recovered the onside kick when Dorian Mausi came up with the ball.
Only, the kick didn’t go the needed 10 yards, and the Seahawks had possession.
And they could exhale and focus on the positives.
Many of those focused on Smith-Njigba, who came into the game needing 158 yards to break Metcalf’s record of 1,303, set in 2020, and got it on a play that snapped with 11 minutes, 31 seconds to play in the third quarter when he reeled in an 8-yard catch.
“Yeah, I knew,” Smith-Njigba said of how cognizant he was of what he needed to break the record. “Yes , sir.”
Most of the work setting the record came earlier – a 63-yard TD pass from Sam Darnold on a third-and-6 play that put the Seahawks ahead for good at 10-3 with 11:02 to play in the second quarter, and a 56-yard reception on the first play of the second half that set up a 13-yard Smith-Njigba TD pass from Darnold two plays later.
On the first TD, Smith-Njigba motioned from the left to the right and he and Darnold noted that left him matched up with safety Amani Hooker in man coverage, not what the Titans probably wanted.
Smith-Njigba said he adjusted his route and Darnold noticed and the result was a TD.
“Yeah, I think they might have had a coverage bust on that one,” Macdonald said. “But you’ve got to make them pay for that.”
The Seahawks lamented that their next two drives each ended in field goals after getting inside the Tennessee 20.
Still, the result was a 16-3 halftime lead.
When Darnold hit Smith-Njigba again to make it 23-3 with 13:19 left, the rout that was expected when the Seahawks were installed as 13-point favorites – tying the most they ever have been for a road game – seemed on.
The Titans got a 90-yard punt return from Chimere Dike to make it 23-10 early in the third.
Macdonald and the Seahawks felt that Titans corner Micah Robinson grabbing a hold of the jersey of Derion Kendrick played a role.
“Yeah, I saw something that happened,” Macdonald said coyly. “But we’ve got to play better. Guy likes to go around the edge and we had no edge. That’s the gunner’s responsibility, and it’s our net’s responsibility, so we’ve got to play that better. But I saw a few things on that one.”
It figured to be just a blip when the Seahawks responded with a quick 74-yard drive capped by a 5-yard run by Zach Charbonnet to take a 30-10 lead with 6:40 left in the third quarter.
But the offense could gain only 25 yards on its next two series, stopped on downs once when Darnold was sacked and going three-and-out on the other while Ward kept running around and buying time and guiding the Titans to two scores.
Those drives were sandwiched around a series in which the Titans were stopped on a fourth down at the Seattle 35, a march derailed mostly because Derick Hall drew a hold and got a sack on consecutive plays.
“It’s the NFL,” linebacker Drake Thomas said. “They are going to make plays, too. It’s more so, I feel like about how you respond in those moments, and I feel like we responded well. We got the W, so that’s all that matters.”
It says something about what the Seahawks have done this year that they were almost a two-touchdown favorite in the first place.
The win allows them to keep pace with the Rams in the NFC West and capped a tough stretch of three of four games on the road. They now have three of four at home starting with a visit from the Vikings next Sunday.
“Look, you don’t play teams’ records in this league,” Macdonald said. “Teams are too talented.”
For only the second time all season, the Seahawks didn’t have a turnover after Darnold had four against the Rams, something Macdonald called “a major point of emphasis.”
Three Darnold passes could have been picks, including one in the first quarter that loomed particularly precarious before Kenneth Walker III broke it up.
“The ball was in jeopardy a couple times,” Macdonald said.
But usually, the ball was in Smith-Njigba’s hands.
He finished with eight receptions for 167 yards, the second-best total of his career, and has 1,313 for the season.
“Yeah, it’s unbelievable, man,” Darnold said. “Just the way that he’s been able to play this year, every single game. It’s tough to be that consistent.”