Curtain call
DETROIT – The Seattle Seahawks have been stellar most of the season in the red zone. They weren’t Sunday. Their defense hasn’t yielded a lot of big plays. They did Sunday.
Their receivers have been sure-handed all season. They weren’t Sunday. They’ve been one of the least penalized teams in the NFL for years. Not so on Sunday.
Seattle’s strengths turned into liabilities on the NFL’s grandest stage, a lethal combination that led to a 21-10 loss to Pittsburgh in Super Bowl XL before a heavily pro-Steelers crowd of 68,206 at Ford Field.
“The bottom line is they executed and made plays and didn’t make stupid mistakes, and we did,” Seahawks defensive end Grant Wistrom said. “That’s why we lost the game.”
Pittsburgh (15-5), which won its last eight games, including playoff victories over the AFC’s top three seeds and the NFC’s No. 1 Seahawks, earned the fifth Super Bowl title in the franch-ise’s storied history.
“To see what we did to get here, it was a bond that was created,” coach Bill Cowher said. “This team grew closer these last eight weeks. I’m happy for (owner) Mr. (Dan) Rooney and the city of Pittsburgh.”
The Seahawks (15-4) were out of sync most of the way, making mistakes of every variety. Two of the biggest came with the Steelers leading 14-10 early in the fourth quarter. Jerramy Stevens’ reception appeared to move the ball to the 1, but it was nullified by a holding penalty. Three plays later, Matt Hasselbeck was intercepted near the goal line.
Pittsburgh, which wasn’t at the top of its game either, capitalized with a swift, four-play drive for the clinching touchdown.
On the fourth play, receiver Antwaan Randle El took a handoff from Willie Parker and fired a 43-yard touchdown pass to Hines Ward, the game’s MVP. Pittsburgh led 21-10 with 8:56 remaining, and that proved to be enough cushion after Seattle’s next possession ended like so many before it, by stalling in Steeler territory.
“He threw a hell of a ball to me,” said Ward, who finished with five catches for 123 yards. “It gave us momentum and got our crowd back into it.”
Seattle trailed 7-3 after a frustrating first half full of missed opportunities. The Seahawks enjoyed good field position, a sizable edge in yardage and time of possession, but could generate only three points.
Three times they moved into Pittsburgh territory and came away without points.
The first-half miscues included:
A holding penalty on Chris Gray, wiping out an 18-yard completion to Darrell Jackson that would have put the ball on the Steelers’ 23.
A pass interference penalty on Jackson, nullifying his 16-yard touchdown catch. Seattle settled for Josh Brown’s 47-yard field goal.
A holding penalty on Etric Pruitt, erasing Peter Warrick’s 34-yard punt return and costing Seattle 29 yards of field position. Jerramy Stevens couldn’t hang on to a perfectly thrown pass after absorbing a big hit by safety Chris Hope. Instead of a first down near the Steelers’ 30, Seattle was forced to punt.
Tom Rouen being unable to pin the Steelers in bad field position as three of his punts sailed into the end zone.
Another special-teams penalty, a sore spot for Seattle all season, on a kick return cost the Seahawks 10 yards of field position late in the half. On that same series, Jackson appeared to make a 40-yard touchdown reception, but his right foot came down out of bounds. Those 10 yards might have come in handy when Brown narrowly missed a 54-yard field-goal attempt with 2 seconds remaining.
“I’m more disappointed in how we played in certain areas,” Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren said. “We were careless with the ball and we had way too many penalties.”
Meanwhile, Pittsburgh stumbled through a first down-free first quarter. The Steelers had 17 total yards, 10 of those coming on a meaningless scramble by quarterback Ben Roethlisberger.
While Seattle fired and fell back, Pittsburgh completed – by centimeters – its only sustained drive of the half. Roethlisberger made a nifty 12-yard shovel pass to Ward for a conversion on third down but Seattle appeared to weather the storm when Pittsburgh faced third-and-28 from the 40.
Roethlisberger scrambled left, alertly stopped near the line of scrimmage and heaved a 37-yard completion to Ward. On third down from the 1, Roethlisberger bootlegged left and dove for the goal line. Officials ruled it a touchdown and the call stood after a replay review.
Pittsburgh led 7-3, despite being outgained by 41 yards and possessing the ball for 3 minutes, 30 seconds less than Seattle.
The Steelers made up the yardage differential in a hurry. On the second play of the third quarter, Parker raced 75 yards over the right side for the longest touchdown run in Super Bowl history.
Seattle had a chance to answer, but Stevens dropped another well-thrown pass at the 7. Brown’s 50-yard field goal missed left by perhaps 2 yards on yet another empty possession.
Pittsburgh was poised to take complete command until Roethlisberger was intercepted by Kelly Herndon near the Seahawks’ goal line. Herndon’s Super Bowl-record 76-yard return set up Hasselbeck’s 16-yard touchdown strike to Stevens midway through the third quarter.
Those would be Seattle’s last points of the season.
“Losing a Super Bowl is as bad as it gets,” Wistrom said. “It only gets worse the next few weeks and months because you have time to sit back and think about what you could have done differently.”