Seahawks score go-ahead TD late for second straight week, keep playoff hopes alive

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Tight end Colby Parkinson was carrying the collective weight of the Seahawks world as he leapt for a pass from Geno Smith in the corner of the end zone with 57 seconds remaining Sunday.

All that rode on the play was Seattle avoiding falling under .500 while regaining control of its playoff fate, keeping hope alive of winning out and finishing the season with 10 wins.

“The season is on the line” is the way veteran receiver Tyler Lockett put Seattle’s last drive of the game.

But all of the pressure Parkinson could have felt from the outside might have paled in comparison to what he felt internally.

The play is one that the Seahawks have been working on since training camp but had yet to call all season, the time just never seeming right – no matter how hard Parkinson might have tried.

“This is the first time we called (the play), and I didn’t want it to be the last time,” Parkinson said later with a smile. “So I had to come down with the ball.”

When he did, he gave Seattle a 20-17 lead with 57 seconds left. And when the defense followed with two sacks to kill Tennessee’s last-ditch chance to try to tie it or win it, the Seahawks had gotten their biggest win in six days.

In the locker room, afterward, though, it was hard to tell that it didn’t feel like their win biggest in years, just as did Monday’s similar-looking fourth-quarter comeback win, also by a 20-17 score.

The win, coupled with Minnesota’s loss to Detroit, means that Seattle now has a clear and simple path to the playoffs – beat Pittsburgh Sunday then win at Arizona on the last weekend of the season and the Seahawks are in.

Put another way, after the games of Sunday, Seattle held the No. 7 seed, which meant as of now the Seahawks would open the postseason with a rematch of their Week 2 win at Detroit.

“That’s a good thing,” Carroll said of Seattle again controlling its playoff fate, needing only to win out and no help from anyone else. “This week. That’s all there is, this week.”

Carroll was more verbose about the way Seattle got its win, driving the length of the field twice in the fourth quarter to score go-ahead TDs, shaking off a sluggish start in which the Seahawks indeed appeared to have a hangover from the wild win over the Eagles.

“Another dramatic finish for you guys,” he said as he greeted the media afterward. “A sensational finish to get that done under all the circumstances. There’s a lot of them. Monday night, coming off the road, early game, all that kind of stuff people usually talk about had nothing to do with it.”

This comeback came with just a slightly lowered degree of difficulty – Smith was back in the starting saddle after Drew Lock held the reins against the Eagles – with Seattle needing only to go 75 yards in 14 plays in 2:24 compared to the 92-yard, eight-play march in 1:28 to beat the Eagles.

Seattle started at its own 25 after Derrick Henry scored a 2-yard rushing touchdown to put the Titans (5-10) ahead 17-13 with 3:21 left.

The game – and, with each game carrying the stakes that they are, the season – seemed in dire straits when Seattle faced a third-and-14 at its own 32 at the two-minute warning.

But Smith hit Jaxon Smith-Njigba for 18 yards as the Titans were also called for a penalty that would have given Seattle a first down.

And that appeared all the break Seattle needed.

Passes of 12 and 8 yards to Tyler Lockett helped get Seattle to the Titans’ 27. There, on a second down, Tennessee cornerback Tre Avery was called for defensive pass interference on DK Metcalf, taking it to the 5.

Two Zach Charbonnet runs – one for a gain of 3 yards, another for a loss of 3 yards – set up third-and-goal at the 5.

Then came the play Parkinson has been waiting for all season.

“Yeah, I’ve been itching to get it off the call sheet to say the least,” said Parkinson, who had three prior TDs to his name, one earlier this year at San Francisco.

On the play in question, Parkinson was lined up as the lone receiver to the left of Smith, with Metcalf, Lockett and Smith-Njigba all to the right. The hope was that Tennessee would counter with man coverage against Parkinson, which the Titans did, putting the 5-11, 181-pound Avery on the 6-7, 265-pound Parkinson.

It wasn’t just Parkinson who knew what was coming. So did all of his teammates.

“It’s something we’ve been looking forward to doing, working on,” Carroll said. “Everybody was watching him, and everybody knew it was going to him. And he came through with a great play. It was a great throw and also a great catch to win it right there.”

Or as Smith said: “I feel like we practiced it every day since the start of training camp. It’s just that the situation hasn’t come yet. But, at the right time, at the perfect time, coach called it, and we knew exactly what we were going to do. We’ve repped it so many times. Colby knew exactly how the ball was going to come. Strong hands made that catch, got in the end zone, that was great.”

Seattle trailed 10-3 at halftime as the Titans rushed for 113 yards on 15 carries.

“Early, our energy was low,” said defensive lineman Dre’Mont Jones.

But Carroll emphasized that the game was still there to be had.

“It was a slow start today,” Carroll said. “Kind of marred it. But we came in at halftime, and we knew that it was our game to go win. And so, we got it done again.”

Seattle responded by scoring on all three of its second half drives – a field goal, followed by a seasonlong 96-yard drive capped by Smith’s 11-yard TD pass to Metcalf, and the final clincher.

In between, the Seahawks allowed a 75-yard TD drive featuring two key penalties, including an unnecessary roughness call on Artie Burns after a second-down play that would have forced Tennessee into a third-and-4 at the 5. Instead, the Burns penalty – for shoving Tennessee receiver Mason Kinsey after the play – gave Tennessee a first down at the 2 and an easy score on the next snap.

“That’s just wrong,” Carroll said. “We can’t play like that.”

But the Smith-led drive and the Parkinson TD catch made everything right and left the Seahawks flying home on Christmas Eve with visions of playoffs firmly in their heads – and that four-game losing streak that once looked like it would threaten to kill the season suddenly seeming like a long time ago.

“The belief in this locker room is strong, that we can take on whatever we’ve got to take on, that we’ll have our wits together and we’ll execute and function no matter how long it takes to get it,” Carroll said. “That’s a powerful, powerful trait. So hopefully we can hold on to that.”