{"id":654274,"date":"2026-01-04T22:04:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-04T22:04:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/654274\/"},"modified":"2026-01-04T22:04:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-04T22:04:13","slug":"the-numbers-behind-seattle-seahawks-defensive-masterpiece","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/654274\/","title":{"rendered":"The numbers behind Seattle Seahawks&#8217; defensive masterpiece"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The San Francisco 49ers entered Saturday night\u2019s winner-take-all NFC West showdown looking like world beaters on offense, having averaged 42.3 points and 455.3 total yards over their previous three games.<\/p>\n<p>But they were simply no match for the Seattle Seahawks\u2019 dominant defense.<\/p>\n<p>The Seahawks completely suffocated the 49ers\u2019 high-flying attack, limiting them to just 173 total yards in a <a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/nfl\/seattle-seahawks\/seattle-seahawks-top-5-plays-win-49ers\/1834343\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">13-3 victory<\/a> that gave Seattle both the NFC West title and the NFC\u2019s No. 1 seed.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/nfl\/seattle-seahawks\/seattle-seahawks-top-5-plays-win-49ers\/1834343\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The 5 biggest plays that delivered Seahawks\u2019 win over 49ers<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Just how impressive was Mike Macdonald\u2019s defense on Saturday night? Here\u2019s a closer look.<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 3 \u2013 The Seahawks held the 49ers to just 3 points, which was their lowest point total since they scored 3 points in Kyle Shanahan\u2019s head-coaching debut with San Francisco in Week 1 of 2017. This was one of just seven times over the past 15 seasons that the 49ers have been held to 3 points or fewer. Four of those seven instances came in regular-season losses to the Seahawks (2013, 2014, 2015 and 2025).<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 173 \u2013 The Seahawks held the 49ers to just 173 total yards, which were their fewest in a regular-season over Shanahan\u2019s nine seasons at the helm. The last time the 49ers had fewer total yards in a regular-season game was in Week 13 of 2016.<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 23 \u2013 The Seahawks held 49ers star running back Christian McCaffrey to just 23 rushing yards, which were his fewest in 54 regular-season or postseason games since arriving in San Francisco in a 2022 midseason trade. McCaffrey\u2019s 57 yards from scrimmage on Saturday night were tied for the third-fewest of his 49ers tenure.<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 127 \u2013 The Seahawks limited 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy to just 127 passing yards. That\u2019s the third-lowest total of Purdy\u2019s four-year NFL career, among games in which he had at least 10 pass attempts. Purdy\u2019s 4.7 yards per pass attempt on Saturday night was also the third-lowest mark of his career.<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 3 \u2013 The Seahawks forced the 49ers into three three-and-out punts on Saturday night. The 49ers didn\u2019t have a single three-and-out over their previous three games.<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 2 \u2013 The Seahawks, who shut out the Minnesota Vikings in Week 13, are the only NFL team to hold multiple opponents to 3 points or fewer this season.<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 13 \u2013 The Seahawks became just the fourth NFL team since 2000 to allow fewer than 300 total yards at least 13 times in a season, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/stathead\/football\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Stathead<\/a>. The others were the 2008 Pittsburgh Steelers (15 times), the 2006 Baltimore Ravens (13) and the 2001 Steelers (13).<\/p>\n<p>More on Seattle Seahawks\u2019 win<\/p>\n<p>\u2022\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/nfl\/seattle-seahawks\/seahawks-gm-positive-update-bryant-cross-playoff-opener\/1834406\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Seahawks GM shares positive updates on Bryant, Cross for playoffs<\/a><br \/>\u2022\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/nfl\/seattle-seahawks\/drake-thomas-unlikely-hero-seattle-seahawks-landmark-win-49ers\/1834385\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Drake Thomas an unlikely hero in Seattle Seahawks\u2019 landmark win<\/a><br \/>\u2022\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/nfl\/seattle-seahawks\/surging-run-game-shines-seattle-seahawks-massive-win-49ers\/1834332\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Seahawks\u2019 season-long commitment to run game pays off in massive win<\/a><br \/>\u2022 <a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/nfl\/seattle-seahawks\/stacy-rost-hawks-show-why-their-biggest-flaw-may-not-matter\/1834367\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Stacy Rost: Seattle Seahawks show their fatal flaw may not matter<\/a><br \/>\u2022\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/nfl\/seattle-seahawks\/wyman-seahawks-earn-a-dominant-win-over-49ers\/1834347\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Wyman: Seattle Seahawks earn a \u2018dominant win\u2019 over 49ers<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a class=\"twitter-follow-button\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CameronVanTil\" data-show-count=\"false\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Follow @CameronVanTil<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sports.mynorthwest.com\/newsletters\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-perfmatters-preload=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/SeattleSportsEmail-830x100-1.jpg\" style=\"margin: 0 auto;\" class=\"mobile-signup\"\/>\t&#13;<br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/SeattleSportsEmail-830x100-1.jpg\" style=\"margin: 0 auto;\" class=\"desktop-signup\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>                    <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The San Francisco 49ers entered Saturday night\u2019s winner-take-all NFC West showdown looking like world beaters on offense, having&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654275,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2081],"tags":[7,1631,3932,3930,6,238,237,261,2635,9,3931,1951,1952],"class_list":{"0":"post-654274","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-seattle-seahawks","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-home","10":"tag-mynorthwest-com","11":"tag-mynorthwest-com-seattle-news","12":"tag-nfl","13":"tag-seahawks","14":"tag-seattle","15":"tag-seattle-seahawks","16":"tag-seattleseahawks","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-talk-and-community","19":"tag-traffic","20":"tag-weather"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115839098780747882","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654274\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}