SANTA CLARA, Calif. \u2014 Defense won this championship.<\/p>\n
Devon Witherspoon, Derick Hall, Byron Murphy and the rest of Mike Macdonald\u2019s ferocious unit pummeled Drake Maye, and the Seattle Seahawks beat the New England Patriots, 29-13, on Sunday to win the franchise\u2019s second Super Bowl.<\/p>\n
Sam Darnold\u00a0threw a touchdown pass\u00a0to AJ Barner, Kenneth Walker III ran for 135 yards and Jason Myers set a Super Bowl record by making all five of his field-goal tries.<\/p>\n
Walker became the first running back to win the Super Bowl MVP award since Terrell Davis 28 years ago.<\/p>\n
Uchenna Nwosu punctuated a punishing defensive performance by\u00a0snagging Maye\u2019s pass in the air\u00a0after Witherspoon hit his arm and ran it back 45 yards for a pick-6.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a one-of-a-kind feeling, bro,\u201d Witherspoon said. \u201cYou talk about a group of guys who battle every day, who believe in each other and believe in their coach, you can\u2019t describe this group no better. It\u2019s just a one-of-a-kind feeling. I was just so happy to battle with these guys. We went through a lot, but we believed. All of you all doubters out there who said all that other stuff, you all don\u2019t know what\u2019s going on in this building. We\u2019re one of one over here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Seattle\u2019s \u201cDark Side\u201d defense helped Darnold become the first quarterback in the 2018 draft class to win a Super Bowl, ahead of Josh Allen, Baker Mayfield and Lamar Jackson.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo do this with this team, I wouldn\u2019t want it any other way,\u201d Darnold said. \u201cSo proud of our guys, our defense. I mean, I can\u2019t say enough great things about our defense, our special teams.\u201d<\/p>\n
Labeled a bust, dumped by two teams and considered expendable by two others, Darnold proved his doubters wrong while helping the Seahawks go 17-3.<\/p>\n
After leading the NFL with 20 turnovers in the regular season, Darnold didn\u2019t have any in three playoff games. He wasn\u2019t particularly sharp against a solid Patriots defense but protected the ball and made enough plays, finishing 19 of 38 for 202 yards.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know we won the Super Bowl, but we could have been a little bit better on offense, but I don\u2019t care about that right now,\u201d Darnold said. \u201cIt\u2019s an unbelievable feeling, man. I\u2019m just so happy for the guys in the locker room and the coaches that put in so much effort throughout the whole season.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Seahawks sacked Maye six times, including two apiece by Hall and Murphy.\u00a0Hall\u2019s strip-sack\u00a0late in the third quarter set up a short field and Darnold connected with Barner on 16-yard scoring toss to make it 19-0.<\/p>\n
Julian Love\u2019s interception\u00a0set up another field goal that made it 22-7 with 5:35 left.<\/p>\n
The Patriots (17-4) punted on the first eight drives, excluding a kneel-down to end the first half.<\/p>\n
Down 19-0, Maye and the New England offense finally got going. He hit Mack Hollins over the middle in traffic for 24 yards and then lofted a perfect 35-yard TD pass to Hollins down the left side to cut the deficit to 19-7.<\/p>\n
Tom Brady once led Bill Belichick\u2019s Patriots to the greatest comeback in Super Bowl history, when New England rallied from a 28-3 deficit against Atlanta for a 34-28 overtime victory.<\/p>\n
But Maye, who was runner-up to Matthew Stafford for the\u00a0AP NFL MVP award\u00a0in the closest race in two decades, didn\u2019t come close. He had a chance to get it closer, but his ill-advised pass into triple coverage was picked by Love and the Patriots trailed by 15 when they got the ball back with 5:35 left.<\/p>\n
Then came Nwosu\u2019s touchdown, a fitting way to cap an overwhelming effort by the NFL\u2019s stingiest defense.<\/p>\n
Maye\u2019s 7-yard TD pass to Rhamondre Stevenson late in the game only made the margin smaller.<\/p>\n
The Seahawks took a 3-0 lead on Myers\u2019 33-yard field goal on the game\u2019s opening drive. Myers connected from 39 and 41 yards to extend the lead to 9-0 at halftime. He was good from 41 on Seattle\u2019s first drive of the third quarter to make it 12-0.<\/p>\n
Patriots player of the game<\/p>\n
Cornerback Christian Gonzalez made two outstanding plays to prevent potential touchdowns in the second quarter. He raced back and leaped in the air to slap away a deep pass to Rashid Shaheed that could have been a 76-yard TD.<\/p>\n
On Seattle\u2019s last drive in the first half, Gonzalez knocked down a pass to All-Pro wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba that would have been a 23-yard TD.<\/p>\n
Mills gets a two-for-one sack<\/p>\n
Rylie Mills pushed left guard Jared Wilson into Maye and took both of them down on one of Seattle\u2019s sacks.<\/p>\n
Bad Bunny shines at halftime<\/p>\n
Bad Bunny headlined a visually stunning halftime performance that also featured appearances by Lady Gaga and Ricky Martin. The Grammy-winning Puerto Rican artist entirely in Spanish.<\/p>\n
Patriots denied a record seventh title<\/p>\n
The Patriots failed to win the franchise\u2019s seventh Super Bowl, which would have set an NFL record. They\u2019re tied with the Steelers with six championships.<\/p>\n
AP NFL Coach of the Year Mike Vrabel was aiming to become the fifth person to win a Super Bowl as a player and head coach and the first to do both with the same team.<\/p>\n
The 23-year-old Maye was trying to become the youngest QB to win a Lombardi Trophy. Ben Roethlisberger still holds that mark.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SANTA CLARA, Calif. \u2014 Defense won this championship. Devon Witherspoon, Derick Hall, Byron Murphy and the rest of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110322,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[1418,178,180,179,726,181],"class_list":{"0":"post-110321","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scranton","8":"tag-nfl","9":"tag-scranton","10":"tag-scranton-headlines","11":"tag-scranton-news","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-top-stories-stt"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110321","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110321"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110321\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110321"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}