SEATTLE – It certainly wasn’t pretty, but the Seattle Seahawks found a way.

Seattle Seahawks win: Instant reaction | Recap | Box Score

Jason Myers hit six field goals – including a game-winning 56-yarder with 18 seconds remaining – to give Seattle an 18-16 victory over 44-year-old Philip Rivers and the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday.

With the win, the Seahawks (11-3) remained tied with the Los Angeles Rams (11-3) atop the NFC West ahead of their massive showdown on Thursday night.

Here’s what stood out from Seattle’s nail-biting escape.

A troubling trend

The Seahawks sputtered to another slow start on Sunday, mustering just six points and 80 total yards in the first half.

It marked the third straight game that Seattle entered halftime having scored just six points on offense. And over the past five games, the Seahawks have totaled only one first-half offensive touchdown – a 63-yard TD pass from Sam Darnold to Jaxon Smith-Njigba against the two-win Tennessee Titans.

The Seahawks had some exceptionally dominant first halves earlier this season, scoring 30-plus points before halftime in three of their first nine games. But since then, slow starts have become a troubling trend. Seattle will need to get going quicker against better competition, especially in Thursday night’s showdown against the Rams.

Run game takes step back

The Seahawks’ ground attack had made strides of late, averaging 140.2 yards per game and 4.4 yards per carry over the previous five games. During that stretch, Seattle topped 110 rushing yards in all five contests.

But on Sunday, the Seahawks had their worst rushing performance of the year. Facing a Colts defensive front that was allowing the third-fewest yards per carry in the NFL, Seattle was held to a season-low 49 yards on 22 carries for a season-low 2.2-yard average.

Zach Charbonnet finished with just 31 yards on eight carries, while Kenneth Walker III had just 17 yards on nine carries. The Seahawks didn’t have a run longer than 8 yards all day.

Finding a way

For as ugly as it was, Seattle deserves credit for finding a way to emerge with another win.

Trailing 13-12 with 8:09 remaining, Darnold guided the Seahawks on an 11-play, 82-yard field-goal drive – highlighted by a 39-yard completion to Smith-Njigba.

And then, after the Colts regained a 16-15 lead with 47 seconds left, Rashid Shaheed returned the ensuing kickoff 28 yards to set up Seattle on its own 37-yard line. With no timeouts in hand, Darnold then hit Shaheed for completions of 17 and 8 yards, which moved the Seahawks to the Colts’ 38 to set up Myers’ game-winner.

Ice in his veins

On a day when they needed their kicker to be perfect, Myers came through in a big way.

Myers hit all six of his field-goal attempts, including the game-winning 56-yarder, a 52-yarder, a 47-yarder and a 46-yarder.

The two-time Pro Bowler has made 24 of his past 25 field goals over the past seven games, including 13 of 14 attempts from 40-plus yards out. His only miss during that stretch was the 61-yarder as time expired in Seattle’s Week 11 loss to the Rams.

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