Seahawks 18, Colts 16
MIKE MACDONALD: All right, man, that was a great football game. You got give the Colts a lot of credit. They had a great game plan; executed it well.
I'll tell you what, our guys just fight tooth and nail to the absolute end, and wins in this league are -- come in all different shapes and sizes and great teams figure out a way to win games.
That's what we're trying to be, so I'm proud of our effort. Man, we are mentally tough. We stuck together. There is plenty we want to work on and improve, but the way we closed that game out was just phenomenal just in terms of the fight. J-Myers six field goals, having each other's backs, great kickoff return there at the end, Coby with the pick. I mean, just a great effort. Great effort.
There are things that we are going to learn from out of this game, red zone, time of possession, field position, defensively being able to adjust as the game goes on, which I thought we did a great job of, but that's going to happen. Games will be like this coming down the stretch.
So you got to learn, figure out ways to win them, so I'm proud that we did.
Q. You mentioned this already, but six for six with a 56-yarder that went in. What can you say about that?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, I mean, just talk about picking each other up, just being there when we need him, being ready, steady. I mean, I think our field goal operation and protection was really good, too.
But, yeah, it was just six field goals, man. It's not what you want, but when needed, it's great to have them.
Q. Mike, where were you on the time that you wanted to start using your timeouts on defense? When the ball got where?
MIKE MACDONALD: Well, it's kind of a function of like, hey, as this kind of declares as the last possession, even though they still had three timeouts, you know, you're trying to figure out a way like if it doesn't go your way you have a chance to come back and win it.
Brian Eayrs did a phenomenal job managing it and he was really decisive and really -- I gave him a lot of the credit. He got a game ball in the locker room because he really put us in position to go still have chance to win the game.
Q. Were you and Brian assessing them going to kick if almost any distance?
MIKE MACDONALD: That was actually deeper than we anticipated, so guy made a heck of a kick. We thought it was beyond his line but he made a tremendous kick.
Q. Was there something they did? Obviously here is a guy you're facing, 44 year old quarterback, hasn't played in five years. Maybe sort of human nature, perhaps a look ahead? Seem like the team came out a little lethargic today, especially in the first half.
MIKE MACDONALD: No, we're trying to -- we do our process and we go attack it, let's go. Now, they had a really good game plan in terms of how they were operating and you got to take your hat off to Phil. I mean, just did a great job managing the game. Didn't put the ball in jeopardy until he had to.
We could have probably forced more of situations but they did a good job. So it is what it is. They're a good football team.
Q. Jalen Sundell back in the starting lineup at center today. What went into that decision?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, first of all, Olu did a phenomenal job filling in for him. Felt like Jalen was a starter before and he was healthy and ready to go and had a great week of practice, so we went with Jalen.
Q. What do you make of the offense struggling in the first half like it did?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, we got to improve, be better, start faster. We'll look at our openers here. Couple games where our openers weren't hitting as well as we want. We'll look at it.
But we want to start fast. The field position in the first half was -- we were in tough situations, you know. Like the field was definitely tilted against us. When we're in those situations we got to get out of those things.
And when we did, then we have a big kick return there at some point, and so it flipped again. We got to improve in that area.
Q. They're a pretty good run defense overall. What did you see from your inability to get going there today?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, just when you don't have the ball it's hard to stick and get -- and find a bunch of different runs to get to.
That's the first thing.
We have to be more effective early so we can get down to our game plan and find some ways to run it. We got to start faster, block it better, run it better, game plan it better, the whole thing.
Q. How good was Sam the last drive? Did you feel comfortable with Jason from 56 there?
MIKE MACDONALD: First, Sam did a great job. The first play was awesome and then they're going to be pretty aggressive there once you're at the line. He was decisive getting the ball on the sideline and thought Klint did a good job calling it.
That's stuff we work on all the time. Sam, I mean, he's been tremendous for us in two-minute this year. We would've liked to get the first down. Every yard matters in some of those field goal things, so we were trying to move it forward.
But once you're in -- obviously you don't want to go backwards once you're inside range.
Q. Holding a back like Taylor to under 100 yards, four yards a carry, what did you think of the run defense?
MIKE MACDONALD: I'll tell you what, our front I thought really battled. I mean, playing a lot of those runs in split safety, that's really what we do. They did a great job.
Now, there are some things -- it was great to have Riley go out there and have his first game experience and he's going to learn from some of those things about what it's like. I think got to give him a lot of credit. He is out there, he's battling, and hadn't done it in a long time.
So it was great to have him.
Q. For Shaheed to be a factor on the last drive, how important was that?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, I mean, incredibly important. We don't move the ball we're going to lose the game. You got to do it in a hurry. You have no timeouts and so you got get the ball down the field.
Q. Once you saw how Rivers was throwing it, how did you change in coverage or pressure?
MIKE MACDONALD: Well, I mean, I tell you, he threw it effectively when he needed to. It became clear that the offense they had been running was taking a pretty dramatic shift so we had to do it as well.
But you can only run the things you've been repping. You can't just invent defense. We had a couple adjustments in terms of some coverage structures that we haven't repped all week and the guys did a great job with that.
But, it probably altered how we called some of the things, some of the categories, how we game plan when we're going to call certain coverage in certain situations. That's pretty much par for the course; kind of doing that every game.
Q. How much did it make you play tighter on the receivers knowing the ball wasn't going down the field?
MIKE MACDONALD: I wouldn't say it altered like the matchiness of our calls. I wouldn't say that.
Q. You mentioned earlier wins come in all shapes and sizes. You've had a lot of wins this year by pretty big margins. Is this good for the guys to have?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, that's a great point, John. I think it is. I mean, it's great to win by multiple scores and put games away in the fourth quarter. We'll take those every time.
But this is the NFL and these teams are really, really good. I'm just proud that we fought and found a way to win this tight game. This is what it's going to be like from here on out.
Q. Felt like first three quarters that they were able to consistently get the extra rusher after Sam and get him off his spot. How did you see that change in the fourth quarter with the way the pass protection was holding up?
MIKE MACDONALD: Well, we blew one pass protection that we repped all week and just had an absolute mental error. I thought our protection plan was good.
You know, I think they had another free runner on a four-strong. Other than that, I mean, I just felt like we probably needed more ways to get the ball out in those situations. We just stuck to it and kept playing. I wouldn't say they had an extra runner all game. It was just a couple plays.
Q. Abe left and came back. He is okay?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, to my knowledge he's okay.
Q. Same question with Derick, he's all right?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah. Yeah.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports