The Seahawks had an offensive explosion against the 7-1 New England Patriots. Through the course of the game, they accumulated 420 offensive yards through the ground and air and scored 31 points. The team used interesting combinations of routes and blocking to allow the receivers and runners to pick up big gains for them. We’re going to take a look at a few of those plays.
Big Plays: Seattle Seahawks-New England Patriots
First and ten, New England 35, second quarter
Cornerback DeShawn Shead’s best play of the night was at the same time, his worst. New England lines up in a shotgun formation with an empty back field, while Seattle shows a 4-3 front with a single high safety. Malcolm Mitchell (red) is lined up outside the numbers to Tom Brady’s left on the boundary (short) side of the field. Covering him is Shead (black) with safety Earl Thomas (yellow) playing center field. Pre-snap it appears Shead and Sherman are in press coverage, but as the ball is being snapped Shead opens his hips and takes outside leverage, allowing Mitchell the center of the field.
Mitchell runs a deep hitch route that causes Shead to get tripped up and falls on the sideline. While Shead had taken outside leverage, Mitchell fought at the top of his route to get to the outside, which tripped up Shead. He works his way back towards the middle of the field to get his quarterback’s attention. Brady is being pressured at the same time, otherwise this would have been an easy touchdown pass. Thomas doesn’t yet notice that Mitchell is running free, as he is sitting on the hash of the Seattle 41-yard line.
Thomas cheats even farther to the right side of the field thinking that the pass is going to either the tight end Rob Gronkowski or the receiver Julian Edelman. Shead recovers and makes a break for Mitchell, who is running free in the open field. Thomas reads Brady and realizes that the pass is going to Mitchell. He runs a bee line to try and save what would be a sure touchdown.
Brady sees Mitchell splitting Shead and Thomas with a step on both. He scrambles, sets his feet and fires off deep. The throw doesn’t reach Mitchell. It’s under-thrown towards the sideline. Shead stays calm and gets his head around to see that he can make a break on the ball and intercept the pass. Mitchell tries to break up the play but cannot and Seattle comes away with the ball.
If not for defensive tackle Ahtyba Rubin and the strong Seattle front seven this play would have been a disaster. But by disrupting Brady and flushing him from the pocket they allowed the secondary to recover and make a game changing play, thus causing Brady’s first turnover of the year.
Third and six, New England 40, fourth quarter
Seattle comes out in a shotgun look with an empty backfield, splitting out three wide receivers, a tight end and a running back. C.J. Prosise (red) is lined up on the boundary side of the field inside the numbers, Jermaine Kearse (black) is lined up outside the numbers on the same side. New England appears to be in a single high man coverage look based on their alignment and safety Devin McCourty sitting back playing center field. Russell Wilson notices Prosise is matched up with linebacker Elandon Roberts and not a defensive back.
After the snap, Prosise runs a wheel route to the outside while Kearse runs a slant towards the middle of the field. This switch concept is used to try and confuse and delay the defense by making them decide if they need to pass off their assignments or stay with them. If done properly, the route Prosise runs should open up Kearse’s for a first down. Kearse may have been the designated receiver on this play but with the linebacker sitting on the crossing route and Prosise being covered by Roberts, a linebacker, Wilson knew knew at the line of scrimmage that Prosise could be a deep ball opportunity. The pocket collapses pretty quickly as a defensive tackle beats center Justin Britt, who doesn’t receive help from guard Germain Ifedi. If the center of the pocket is clean, Wilson can step up and away from the pressure being brought off the edge.
Wilson gets the ball out and gets hit as Prosise is approaching the 25-yard line. The safety McCourty (yellow) reads Wilson and recognizes that Prosise is getting the ball. Quickly turning his hips while still keeping his eyes on Wilson, he takes an angle towards where he expects the ball to end up. Prosise is beginning to get separation, Roberts has inside leverage but Prosise has a wide swath of field in which Wilson can safely get the ball to him.
As the ball arrives, Prosise has roughly a yard of separation but McCourty is screaming in to make a big hit and knock the ball loose. If Wilson had a cleaner pocket, the ball could have been put over the outside shoulder of Prosise so he could have caught the ball in stride with the opportunity for a touchdown. The ball came in on the inside shoulder and Prosise had to lean towards the safety to catch it forcing him to the ground.
Devin McCourty arrives just milliseconds after the ball and lays a hit on Prosise but the running back had already secured the ball. Roberts makes a diving attempt to knock the ball loose but can’t get home. This play demonstrated Seattle’s ability to run simple route combinations to free up their targets and gain large chunks of yardage.
These two plays were explosive and changed the momentum of the game. Intercepting Tom Brady for the first time this year, and securing a late first and goal to take the lead were essential plays to a Seahawks victory.
