Geno Smith took Seahawks’ losing streak to 49ers personally -- then ends it with TD late
Geno Smith had said this was “very personal,” not beating the team he and his Seahawks absolutely must beat to get to where they want to be.
In the end, Smith fired the ball triumphantly into the tunnel leading into his team’s locker room. And he bent his head to the right onto his pressed hands, Steph Curry’s night-night celebration that ends wins for the local Golden State Warriors.
“In the Bay,” Smith said later Sunday. “Got to do it.”
He did it.
Responding with decisive resilience from his NFL-leading 11th interception of the season the previous quarter, the 34-year-old quarterback led his Seahawks on the defining drive of the new coach Mike Macdonald era. And not just by completing seven of eight passes — including four clutch ones for first downs to Jaxon Smith-Njigba.
Smith included two scrambles on three plays for 13 yards with 23 seconds left and no time outs into the end zone. The only time he got touched on his run to end this streak was when his teammates mobbed him past the goal line.
On the sideline, before his Steph Curry celly, Smith and receiver DK Metcalf hugged.
Seahawks 20, 49ers 17. Levi’s Stadium hushed, all put to bed. The long, galling, six-game losing streak to San Francisco, over.
“Big-time win,” the coach said after Seattle’s first one versus the Niners since Dec. 5, 2021.
The 37-year-old Macdonald, the NFL’s youngest head coach, was the defensive coordinator at the University of Michigan the last time the Seahawks had beaten San Francisco.
It was Smith’s 10th game-winning drive in the fourth quarter or overtime in the 2 1/2 seasons he’s been the Seahawks’ replacement for traded Russell Wilson at quarterback. It was Smith’s seventh game-winning drive late since the start of the 2023 season. That’s tied with Philadelphia’s Jalen Hurts for the most in the NFL in that span.
“He was dynamite,” Macdonald said of his QB.
Smith said on the winning play he saw the 49ers rush only four defenders and drop into deep, vertical coverage into the end zone. Then he saw middle linebacker Fred Warner run inside to the middle of the field to follow Seattle running back Zach Charbonnet. That left the left side of the field open with nothing but green grass to the end zone and the win.
Smith’s run was a calculated gamble. With 23 seconds and no time outs left, if the Niners had run him down before the goal line it would have been a scramble to get back to the line to run another play. Or to even spike the ball to have one more play.
Why did he take off so decisively instead of throwing, as he has more than any other quarterback in the league through 10 games?
“Shoot, man, we gotta win. Just doing whatever it took to win the game,” Smith said.
“In those moments, I just play with instinct.”
To cap a week when the Seahawks cut their leading tackler Tyrel Dodson then had starting center Connor Williams abruptly retire, with no wins in a month and the season threatening to spiral into an abyss, Macdonald’s guys came back.
“Really proud,” Macdonald said.
“Trying to take the next step as a football team really showed up.
“The challenge now is to keep stacking this thing.”
It’s not overstating to say Smith’s heroic drive to beat the 49ers rescued Seattle’s season. The Seahawks (5-5) went from last place in the NFC West to one game behind Arizona (6-4). And they host the Cardinals next Sunday at Lumen Field.
“It means a lot. We kind of took it personal, not winning in six games against these guys,” Smith-Njigba said after the first-round pick last year followed his career day with 180 yards receiving in Seattle’s previous game two weeks ago with 10 catches for another 110 yards.
“To me, I took this like it was a playoff game.”
Former 49ers Pro Bowl left guard Laken Tomlinson was beaming over his custom blue, checkered suit in a Seahawks locker room that boomed bass as loudly as when their old Legion of Boomers used to beat the Niners here a decade ago.
Tomlinson said, correctly — and improbably: “We control our own fate.”
Coby Bryant’s stop
Down 17-13 with 9 1/2 minutes left, Smith and a run for a first down by Kenneth Walker on fourth and 1 led the Seahawks into 49ers territory. A quarterback sneak by Smith looked to get stopped right at the line to gain on third down. Coach Mike Macdonald took the red challenge flag out of his back pocket into his clenched hand and walked up to the side judge on the Seahawks sideline. Like a cornhole player, it looked as if he was about to throw it before the snap on Seattle’s fourth and a half yard.
He waited. He waited. He didn’t challenge the third-down spot.
Macdonald said the sideline official told him it’d be useless to challenge.
“They told me they had a replay assist from (the NFL officiating department in) New York,” Macdonald said, “so you’d just be banging your head against the wall at that point.”
On fourth down, Smith handed the ball to number-two back Zach Charbonnet running left. He got far less near the line to gain than Smith did. Turnover on downs.
The Seahawks remained behind 17-13 with under 4 minutes left.
But a fine tackle in the open field by safety Coby Bryant on third down got Seattle’s defense the needed drive stop. San Francisco punted the ball back to the Seahawks with 2:45 left.
That set up the quarterback’s season-turning drive to victory.
“We had to blow up and go score,” running back Kenneth Walker (14 rushes, 54 yards, Seattle’s other touchdown) said.
Geno Smith’s comeback
Smith had thrown two interceptions inside the 10-yard line to doom the Seahawks to their fifth loss in six games, to the Rams at home two weeks earlier before Seattle’s bye. He apologized to his team in the locker room afterward.
Sunday, he threw his NFL-high 11th interception of the season on the first possession after halftime. He scrambled for a long time then way overthrew Smith-Njigba down the left sideline. Isaac Yiadom intercepted the pass. San Francisco had the ball at the Seattle 27.
But, aided by two penalties on San Francisco’s offense, the Seahawks’ defense held the 49ers to a field goal. That kept Seattle in the game, down only 10-6.
On the ensuing possession, Smith waited and threw on third down to DK Metcalf down the left sideline. Metcalf got behind cornerback Deonmmodore Lenoir for a 26-yard gain. Tunnel-screen passes to tight end AJ Barner and Smith-Njigba totaling 23 yards set up Kenneth Walker’s 1-yard touchdown run out of old-fashioned I formation, with backup lineman Jalen Sundell lead blocking as the fullback.
Seattle led 13-10 late in the third quarter.
But the Seahawks’ defense then couldn’t get off the field. The 49ers took the ensuing possession 14 plays with three conversions on third downs, two of them of 10-plus yards. In the red zone, Purdy completed a pass to Jauan Jennings 2 yards short of the line to gain. But the 212-pound wide receiver bulled through Seahawks cornerback Riq Woolen’s tackle for 4 more yards.
Instead of a field-goal attempt for a tie, the 49ers had first and goal.
And two plays later when Purdy flipped a pass to wide-open Jennings on the left side of the end zone for a touchdown, the 49ers had the lead again. It was 17-13 with 9 1/2 minutes remaining.
The 49ers converted seven of their first 10 third downs.
Seahawks blow prime chance early
The Seahawks professed the need to start fast and play with the lead against the 49ers, for a change.
They blew a huge chance for the lead in the first half. Then Boye Mafe kept them from falling further behind.
Macdonald said this past week he needed to put Devon Witherspoon in better positions to make plays. He was in one-on-one coverage in the right slot on 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey when the Pro Bowl cornerback from his rookie year a season ago batted Purdy’s pass to McCaffrey into the air, back toward the line of scrimmage. Seahawks nose tackle Johnathan Hankins grabbed the deflection for the 12th-year veteran’s first career interception.
Seattle had its big turnover it needed, at the San Francisco 29, down 7-3 early in the second quarter.
The offense’s response: a run by Charbonnet for no yards, a throw-away pass by Smith, and a sack of Smith when left tackle Charles Cross got soundly beaten.
That was while coordinator Ryan Grubb had schemed help for the beleaguered offensive line. He had wide receiver DK Metcalf pass blocking on the play. Metcalf chipped 49ers All-Pro pass rusher Nick Bosa to help tackle Abe Lucas, making his season debut, on the right edge. But Cross got beaten on the left.
The drive of minus-10 yards resulted in a 52-yard field goal by Jason Myers, his second field goal of the half. Instead of taking the lead off the turnover deep in 49ers territory, the Seahawks still trailed 7-6.
San Francisco took the ensuing possession into Seattle territory. Then Mafe saved the Seahawks giving up at least three or perhaps seven points.
The outside linebacker pushed a 49ers offensive linemen 7 yards into Purdy and Seattle’s Dre’Mont Jones for Jones’ second sack of the season, back to midfield. On second down Mafe batted down Purdy’s pass at the line. On third and long, Mafe dropped into pass coverage in the middle of the field and knocked away Purdy’s pass he tried to get behind Mafe to Deebo Samuel on a crossing route.
Instead of trailing by 10-6 or 13-6, the Seahawks got the ball back. The half played out with Seattle down 7-6 into the third quarter.
Olu OIuwatimi’s time
The abrupt retirement of Connor Williams this past week resulted in Olu Oluwatimi’s second career start at center Sunday.
Early in the second quarter, Oluwatimi got good push off the snap on a third and 1. Zach Charbonnet ran behind the fifth-round draft choice last year for a 2-yard gain and one of Seattle’s two conversions on six third downs in the first half.
But three plays later, Oluwatimi snapped the ball hard, wide and high through Smith’s hands for the latest in a season full of bungled shotgun snaps that plagued Williams. The 17-yard loss ruined a Seahawks drive into 49ers territory and led to Michael Dickson punting.
Ty Okada in three safeties
With K’Von Wallace going on injured reserve this week, Macdonald employed Ty Okada as the third safety with Julian Love and Coby Bryant for 40% of snaps Sunday. The team signed Okada from the practice squad Saturday.
Okada ran up hard on a scramble by Purdy around the lost containment of Seattle outside linebacker Dre’Mont Jones in the second quarter. Purdy faked a throw. Okada leaped. The 49ers quarterback ran around him for 13 yards and first down on third and long.
This story was originally published November 17, 2024 at 4:15 PM.
