Geno Smith to Jaxon Smith-Njigba late rescues retro Seahawks in 24-20 win over Browns
Late in a game won by the youngest Seahawk, two of the oldest ones had their say.
With the Lumen Field crowd roaring about Jamal Adams’ first huge play post-major injury that gave them this chance, Tyler Lockett called his teammates around him on the sideline. The Seahawks’ offense was about to take the field with first place on the line.
“I was telling everybody to breathe,” the 31-year-old veteran wide receiver said. “I was telling everybody to relax. Because I think we had about three three-and-outs in a row, and sometimes you can find yourself pressing. ...’Bro, what’s going on? We’ve got to figure this out!’”
Then in the huddle before the game-deciding series against the Cleveland Browns started, debuting, 41-year-old Jason Peters spoke up — for the first time on a game field for the Seahawks.
“This is what we practice and prepare for all week,” the one-time All-Pro tackle with Philadelphia told his teammates, as he played right tackle for the first time for Seattle, “to get these wins in these moments.”
Jamal Adams’ first huge play in his return from major injury set up Smith’s revival from two more turnovers in the second half. He had three consecutive pass completions to begin the final, 2-minute-drill drive. That set up rookie Jaxon Smith-Njigba to win the game.
The first-round draft choice who was a non-factor in Seattle’s first four games read a Browns blitz from the inside, slot cornerback. He knew that meant he was to run a hitch route, basically a bubble screen so Smith could throw before the blitzer reached him.
Smith-Njigba had made the wrong read earlier in the second half, and Cleveland intercepted Smith’s throw outside. This time, Smith-Njigba read correctly. He ran the hitch, took a quick throw from Smith outside left and ran outside a block by DK Metcalf into the end zone for a 9-yard touchdown with 38 seconds remaining in the game.
Lumen Field shook with roars on this throwback day, like it was the old Kingdome. And the Seahawks escaped with a 24-20 victory over the stunned Browns in a game Seattle spent much of trying to lose.
So the 21-year-old Smith-Njigba isn’t just growing from game to game. He’s growing from drive to drive.’
“It was an RPO (run-pass option). Seeing the nickel blitz, I knew I was getting it,” Smith-Njigba said. “Geno spit it to me, and we got in the end zone.”
It was the second consecutive game Smith-Njigba and fellow rookie wide receiver Jake Bobo both scored touchdowns. Bobo’s was Seattle’s first score, on a 2-yard run out of receiver motion.
Bobo’s touchdown came with Seattle’s offense rolled up 178 yards and 17 points in the first quarter.
Then the Seahawks stopped running the ball. They stopped tackling. Smith committed his fifth and sixth turnovers in the last three games. And Cleveland scored 20 of the game’s next 23 points.
Yet thanks to Adams’ heady play then Smith and Smith-Njigba’s redemption, the Seahawks are 5-2 heading to next week’s game at Baltimore.
And a huge bonus to Seattle’s big win: NFC West-rival San Francisco lost, at home to Cincinnati, 31-17. So Seattle is in first place in the division after week eight of the 17-week regular season
“We’re what? We are? Geez,” Seahawks coach Pete Carroll, unsuccessfully pretending he didn’t know.
“Halfway through, we are in pretty good shape. That’s good. That’s good.
“We’re still growing. ...We just need to keep growing.”
Jamal Adams’ heady play
On third and 3 for Cleveland (4-3) just before the 2-minute warning, Adams blitzed from his safety position for one of the few times Sunday. Fill-in quarterback P.J. Walker’s pass banged hard off the leaping Adams’ helmet down the field and into the arms of Seahawks teammate Julian Love for an interception at the Seattle 43 with 1:57 left.
Adams said he wasn’t trying to have the ball his his head. That’s just where his leap took him, into the ball.
His fellow defensive backs behind him couldn’t believe how high the ball bounded off Adams’ noggin.
“It was like in a movie. It was like it was slow motion,” cornerback Riq Woolen said.
Love said it was the first time in his football life he’d gotten an interception off someone’s head.
“I got that from Messi,” Adams said of international soccer legend Lionel Messi.
Smith was 19 for 32 at that point, when Lockett and Peters then talked to the offense. The quarterback then completed his next three throws, for 7 yards to Lockett, 9 yards to DK Metcalf and 27 yards to Noah Fant. Suddenly Seattle was at the Cleveland 14 with :50 second left.
Smith got away with forcing a throw into the end zone to the blanketed Metcalf that could have been intercepted, had the defender had his head turned to the ball.
A 5-yard penalty for the Browns having too many men on the field put the ball at the 9. Smith then threw quickly outside left to Smith-Njigba. The rookie did the rest to save his Seahawks.
Sunday was the first 17-point quarter by the Seahawks since week 7 last season, when they scored 17 in the 1st quarter at the Los Angeles Chargers in a 37-23 win.
Sunday was the third time Seattle scored that many in a quarter in the 14 seasons Pete Carroll has been coach.
But in the second quarter, the Seahawks gained just 64 yards — 48 of them in a final 2-minute drive — and scored zero points.
Smith’s second interception of the game, his sixth turnover in three games, handed the Browns the lead in the third quarter. Smith had his third-down pass over the middle intended for tight end Noah Fant tipped by Cleveland defensive tackle Maurice Hurst to himself for an interception at the Seattle 39.
The Browns turned that into the second field goal of the third quarter by Dustin Hopkins and a 20-17 lead.
The Seahawks’ 14-0 lead was long gone.
Smith could have — should have — had a third interception and second of the third period, and it would have been for a Browns touchdown. Smith and Smith-Njigba were not on the same page with throw and route. Cleveland’s Cameron Mitchell was in the clear at the Seahawks 30-yard line for a interception return for a touchdown and a two-score lead for the Browns, but the ball went off both his hands.
The Seahawks were fortunate to have Michael Dickson punting, for 67 yards, and to remain down only 20-17 entering the fourth quarter.
After they got ahead, the Browns went into power-rushing mode with two tight ends and an extra offensive lineman as an eligible receiver blocking on the end of the line. That worked until 10:49 left in the game, when the Seahawks got a drive stop on a fourth-and-4 incomplete pass Seattle had to be glad Cleveland called.
The Browns had 130 yards rushing when coach Kevin Stefanski called that pass.
The interception off Adams’ head to Love came on a third and 3. Again, the way the Browns were running the Seahawks appreciated the pass call.
Asked if he was surprised the Browns didn’t run there with 2:04 left, Love said: “A little bit,” adding it was an uncharacteristic formation and route concept — slants and out routes — for a power-based offense.
See how they don’t run
As often happens with Seahawks play caller Shane Waldron, the offensive coordinator just didn’t run Kenneth Walker.
From the 10:16 mark of the first quarter into the fourth period, Walker had just four carries. The first drive of the game Seattle’s lead back rushed three times, including a 16-yard dash that step up a touchdown.
Cleveland went from down 7-0 then 14-0 to up 20-17 in that span as Walker barely touched the ball.
When Waldron finally got back to running the ball, with 10 1/2 minutes left in the game, it was with Zach Charbonnet. The rookie’s 13-yard run behind Peters’ block down from right tackle and tight end Will Dissly’s kick-out block got a first down and third and 1. Then Charbonnet ran up the middle and cut right for 20 more yards.
Seattle finally had a string of first downs into Cleveland territory.
Then: Waldron called a pass (for 5 yards to Fant), a pass (incomplete, poorly thrown by Smith before Metcalf’s feet) and a pass. The third-and-10 play became Myles Garrett’s first sack of the game.
The first sack of the game by the league’s top-ranked defense dearly cost the Seahawks. The 9-yard loss took Seattle out of position for Jason Myers to potentially tie the game with 6 minutes left with a long field goal.
Walker finished with eight carries for 66 yards, an average of better than 8 yards per rush. Again, three of those runs came on Seattle’s first five offensive snaps of the game. He ran only fives times over Seattle’s final 50 plays.
Carroll and Smith said Waldron was taking the opportunities the Browns defense offered, particularly in short routes underneath deeper coverage.
“We took what they were giving us. We were protecting the passer better than we thought and, so we went with it and made some yards for us,” Carroll said.
The coach said of Seattle’s rushing offense so far this season, 114 yards Sunday and an average of 106 yards per game entering the weekend: “Spotty.
“It’s there. We haven’t really round it where we can rely on it.”
Seattle burned by screens
Seattle’s defense, improved over the last five games, got burned multiple times by Stefanski calling screen passes. Two of those were to tight end David Njoku, including one for 41 yards to got the Browns out of the end into Seattle territory early in the third quarter.
That set up a field goal by Dustin Hopkins for a 17-17 game midway through the third quarter.
Cleveland’s first touchdown was a pass to Njoku. The tight end delayed his route then went into the middle of the field with no Seahawk near him for an 18-yard-catch-and-stroll score. That cut Seattle’s early lead to 14-7.
Asked what he saw on all the Browns’ successful screen plays, Seahawks linebacker Jordyn Brooks says that’s just it: they didn’t see them.
Another Geno Smith turnover
Smith’s fifth turnover in 2 1/2 games cost Seattle points and a larger lead than 17-14 at halftime. He threw a poor-choice pass outside late to Metcalf that Cleveland cornerback Martin Emerson expected, jumped and intercepted at the Browns 17-yard line.
Seahawks 72-year-old coach Pete Carroll sprinted down the sidelines to the officials at the interception, screaming that Browns pass rusher Myles Garrett lined up offside on the play. Officials ruled otherwise, and the half ended with Seattle’s lead still at three points.
Seattle’s roaring start
The game couldn’t have started any better for the Seahawks if the Browns hadn’t been on the field for the first 10 minutes of it.
Seattle took the ball for the first time and went 80 yards and eight plays on the NFL’s top-ranked defense. The final play was Jake Bobo’s 3-yard touchdown run on an inside hand-off to the rookie wide receiver.
Then Brooks, nine months after he tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee, smashed into Browns quarterback P.J. Walker (starting for injured Deshaun Watson) on a pass play and forced a fumble. Seattle’s Boye Mafe recovered the ball at the Cleveland 41.
On the Seahawks’ second possession, Smith again exploited the Browns leaving Lockett alone underneath deeper coverage. They connected for a 17-yard gain to get Seattle to the Browns 24. Then Smith escaped the only pressure he had in the first half. He moved left out of an ankle-tackle attempt and threw a perfectly lofted pass to Lockett in the end zone over his defender for a 12-yard touchdowns.
It was 14-0 Seattle not fully 10 minutes into the game.
It was as if the throwback uniforms had magical powers.
Until they didn’t.
“Really big day for us. Fantastic illustration of hanging in and staying in and keeping the belief going and giving ourselves a chance to win a football game. Beautiful illustration of that,” Carroll said.
“Thirty seconds or something like that it took to win the football game.
“And to celebrate the throwbacks and all that, I hope the fans loved it. It was fun for us. It was a beautiful image in the stadium. It was really cool to see that.”
This story was originally published October 29, 2023 at 4:10 PM.
