NFC defensive player of the week Julian Love New Dad of the Week for aiding Seahawks win
Like Rudolph heading Santa’s sleigh the night before Christmas, it was SO easy to spot the proudest Seahawks of all following the team’s latest late-comeback win that saved their season.
New Papa Julian Love was smiling so brightly walking out of the visiting locker room in Tennessee he might have been able to power the Seahawks’ Christmas Eve flight back home to Seattle.
That is, back to where he’d just come from the night before.
The NFC defensive player of the week’s wife Julia gave birth to the Love’s first child, healthy baby boy Noah, Friday afternoon in Seattle. On little sleep, like a good new Dad, Love flew to Nashville Saturday arriving after dark, after 5 p.m., ahead of Sunday’s kickoff of Seahawks-Titans at noon local time.
Love was a Seattle standout again, playing while Jamal Adams was again away from the team, inactive with his aching knee.
But let’s be clear: Love would not have played in the Seahawks’ 20-17 victory over Tennessee that seized a playoff spot for Seattle with two games remaining in the regular season — he wouldn’t have been anywhere but with Mom in Seattle — had his wife not given birth by Sunday morning.
Some things do matter more than football.
“I would have stayed home, yeah,” he said with another proud smile.
“You know, I promised that I would be a great teammate. I see these guys in here and I will do whatever I can to see these guys succeed.
“My greatest team I’ve ever had is her.”
Awww, Love could be the NFC’s husband of the week, too.
Love left the team to be with Julia minutes after his two interceptions in the fourth quarter sealed the Seahawks’ comeback win over Philadelphia Monday night. That victory ended Seattle’s four-game losing streak and revived the team’s season.
All this past week the Seahawks sent him game-plan notes electronically. Coaches sent film cut-ups from practices and of the Titans for Love to review when he was at the hospital. He and his wife got there Thursday.
“Yeah, the baby’s healthy. Little Noah. Eight pounds, seven ounces,” Love said, reciting those stats more than his three tackles and one pass defensed in Sunday’s game.
“My wife is a trouper. She toughed it all out. About a 20-hour labor.”
Assured his wife and Noah were healthy and happy, Love left Seattle and arrived on the team’s specially arranged flight for him to Nashville after dark Saturday, about 5 p.m. Central Time for Sunday’s noon local kickoff.
How much had Love slept since Friday before playing Sunday?
“Ooooh,” Love said. “Um...”
Yeah, he’s a new dad.
“A few hours. About three each night when we were in the hospital,” he said. “Then got out here and just tried to nap whenever I could. And then last night I got my most sleep, about seven hours or so.”
Then he smiled. Again.
“Hey, we made it happen,” he said.
“It’s been a lot. It’s been a long week, for sure,” Love said.
“My wife, she did such a great job. Yeah, everybody helped me out, got me out here. And we got a win.”
Julian Love’s challenging week
It wasn’t lost on his teammates and coaches the effort Love made to get to Sunday’s game, let alone play the entire contest to push Seattle into playoff position.
Seahawks coach Pete Carroll, 72, is a multiple time father and grandfather. He knows better than anyone on the team exactly what Love did to get to Sunday’s game across the country from Baby Central.
“Anybody that’s been through (that), has babies, you know,” Carroll said.
“This was as challenging for Julian as could have been and took him days and days to get through the process. I know he wasn’t well rested, but he got through it anyway and did a great job.”
It’s not like the Seahawks could have done without New Pops on Sunday.
Love entered the game having produced Seattle’s last four takeaways on defense the previous two games. If his wife hadn’t delivered Noah by Sunday, the Seahawks would have started mothballed second-year man Coby Bryant at safety. Bryant practiced next to Quandre Diggs in the back of Seattle’s defense all week while Love was away.
But early in Sunday’s game, without any practice this week, Love made two big hits in three plays early to announce, yes, he’d made the trip, after all.
Those hits stopped a Titans drive that had reached the Seahawks 48-yard line in the first quarter. Love’s second thump flattened Chris Moore and separated him from Ryan Tannehill’s third-down pass over the middle. That forced a Tennessee punt and sent the Titans receiver to the sidelines injured.
That’s how the game remained scoreless into the second quarter.
“Yeah, just getting your pads hot, it (helps),” Love said. “Being out there, it is second nature. ...You want to be out there, you want to practice so you can rep things.
“But today I just relied on my film and just my instincts.
Between staying by his wife’s side all week, shouting her out postgame and how he’s played in his first Seahawks season after signing from being the New York Giants’ captain, Love has some All-Pro instincts.
“He had a big hit early on putting number 11 out the game;” Seahawks teammate Jarran Reed said. “Teams are going to see that. They are going to get alligator arms when they see how our DB’s were hitting today.
“Oh, man, tremendous player. A guy that’s always accountable. A guy that’s always in the right place, doing the right thing.”
The best right things Love did this week had nothing to do with the Seahawks.
“There was not a guy in our locker room that would worry about him one bit, that he wouldn’t be able to pull it off,” Carroll said.
“He did a fantastic job.”
This story was originally published December 24, 2023 at 6:28 PM.
