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The last time my beloved Seattle Seahawks won the Super Bowl, in February 2014, I was cramped in a sweaty dorm room in San Diego. Much of my euphoria that night sprung from two things: I was still full of that youthful freedom particular to college freshmen, and I did not think the Seahawks were going to win. Their opponent, the Denver Broncos, had wizened savant Peyton Manning leading a record-setting offense. Those Seahawks were an upstart group, and while their defense was historic in its own right, most of the players who made it so special were still very young. That evening, they wound up forming a circle around the Broncos and summarily stomping them into dust. For anyone who has ever worn the blue and green—as a player or a fan—the team’s 43-8 demolition of Denver allowed for the most stress-free conditions imaginable in the sport’s most meaningful game.
Truthfully, many of my memories from that day were lost in a haze of Coors Light and teenage recklessness. Percy Harvin sprinted the opening kickoff of the second half into the end zone (untouched, I might add), and from there, I mostly kept one eye on the TV just to see if any other hilarity would ensue as the Seahawks coasted to victory. But that play—because of its spectacular, unexpected nature, an early confirmation that the game was over—is one of the sports moments permanently imprinted on my brain. The ball takes a weird hop, luckily right into Harvin’s arms. The strange flight messes with the Broncos’ kick-coverage team, and Harvin finds a lane. All that’s left between the fastest guy on the team and pay dirt is Denver’s hapless kicker. If I close my eyes, I can still conjure the entire sequence like it was yesterday.
Twelve years later, I stood in the stands at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California, and watched the Hawks handily defeat the New England Patriots to win another Super Bowl. I finally have a whole new crop of files to add to the mental hard drive, each one imbued with the same brain-tingling clarity of Harvin’s kick return.
None of those memories were formed during a first half full of field goals and punts, which I will forever associate more with the comforting glow of Bay Area afternoon sun than any of the individual plays I saw on the field. The Seahawks ran the ball a ton—including several fake reverses to Rashid Shaheed that looked like they each would have gained a thousand yards—understandably content with letting Kenneth Walker average 6.7 yards as the Patriots took away Seattle’s passing attack. I will remember Drake Maye having just 48 passing yards at halftime and marveling at that number as Bad Bunny effortlessly charmed the whole stadium. The Seahawks’ offense wasn’t nearly as exciting or inspiring as the Puerto Rican superstar’s performance, but like much of the Seattle sports fan experience, it was a tremendous exercise in patience.
The third quarter saw more of the same from quarterback Sam Darnold’s unit. An errant Darnold third-down throw to Cooper Kupp that would have put the Seahawks in the red zone provoked a groan and my first bit of worry about the final outcome. But on the team’s first drive of the fourth quarter, an AJ Barner touchdown ensured that the 12th Man would remain groan-free for the rest of the night. Sitting in the end of the stadium behind the Seahawks’ offense—the forever goated Madden view—my eyes saw Barner break free as my body involuntarily stood up and let out a cathartic scream.
That sort of unbridled joy, that leaves you without words but full of guttural sound, is a rare thing to experience. It’s something that I always wonder if people who don’t follow sports ever get to taste. Maybe they feel some semblance of that jubilation after an incredible meal or the best sex of their life, but the thing about sports fandom is that it really makes you earn it. No matter what sport it is or how long it’s been since your team last won a ring, the season always feels impossibly long. Without question, the culmination of a championship run is one of the greatest releases any of us can ever hope to know.
The second play that made me emote that way was Julian Love’s interception with just under nine minutes left to play. For most of the game, it felt like the Seahawks’ superb defensive corps deserved more signature moments. In their grandest showcase, as millions of viewers became acquainted with them for the first time, the pack of hyenas that play defense for Seattle suffocated their prey rather than thrashing it. They held the Patriots to 78 yards through the first three quarters, over a third of those coming on one forgettable pass to Kayshon Boutte. Rather than coming up with flashy, NFL Films-worthy highlights, they simply did their job snap after snap, causing negative plays and making surehanded tackles. Love’s interception gave them an opportunity to celebrate a season-long job well done with a miniature sigh of relief, with the clock on their side and the Patriots more than rattled.
There’s always a few instances in a lopsided football game where it gets kind of scary. In a blowout, the more artful elements of the sport give way to something much uglier and more upsetting on a human level. Football has more potential for carnage than any other major sport, and when the stakes are raised and adrenaline hits the danger zone, it can be giddy for some and terrifying for others.
I think Drake Maye was a little terrified on Sunday.
In his first Super Bowl appearance, the 23-year-old showed a greenness we hadn’t seen at all throughout his sophomore season, a campaign that saw him finish second in MVP voting and lead his team to the brink of a championship. It was a tough day at the office for Maye in pretty much every respect, but what was he really supposed to do against Seattle’s swarming, generationally talented defense? The Dark Side, as the fearsome unit is known, provided the toughest test of Maye’s career thus far, and it drove the final dagger into New England with the third play that is now forever seared on my temporal lobe.
As the Pats crossed midfield in a last-ditch effort to make things interesting, they set up for a dropback pass on first down. Incomprehensibly, nobody in a New England jersey seemed to notice that Devon Witherspoon was blitzing from his slot corner position, despite the fact that Witherspoon—one of the league’s true defensive demons—had been doing so all day. Perhaps his most demonic effort yet led to a Uchenna Nwosu pick-six: Witherspoon got home just as Maye was uncorking a pass, popping the ball into the air for Nwosu, who broke away to earn the Dark Side a well-deserved touchdown.
That deep, physical roar strained my vocal chords once more. I knew then that the Seahawks had given me another unforgettable experience, the kind that makes all the heartache of rooting for your hometown teams so worth it. The kind that can make sportswriting feel so romantic—especially when you’re doing it late at night, in a hotel room overlooking a sleeping city, highlights of the game running in the background.
If you’re wondering what it’s like to watch your team lift a trophy in person, it’s even better than you can imagine. To do it in the stadium of your team’s most hated rival, after spending the lead-up to the Super Bowl enjoying the spoils of San Francisco—a true American gem that sparkled even more because of exclusively pleasant interactions with 49ers fans—was a dream.
And now—older, wiser, less full of Coors Light—I get to relive all those new memories whenever I want. Hopefully it won’t take another dozen years for me to make a few more.