Super Bowl LX Recap: Patriots Offense vs. Seahawks Defense
The story of Super Bowl LX was total domination by the Seahawks defense. The final score of 29-13 doesn’t do justice to how much they smothered the Patriots, but some of these numbers below do a pretty good job:
They held the Patriots to just 51 total yards in the first half.
Drake Maye completed just 8 of 18 passes for 60 yards through the first 3 quarters and didn’t start moving the ball until the Patriots fell behind 19-0.
By the time Maye threw a pick-6 to give the Seahawks a 29-7 lead with 4:27 remaining, all but sealing the win, Maye had completed just 15 of 29 passes for 165 yards, 1 touchdown, 2 interceptions, and 3 turnovers (He picked up 130 yards in those final 4-and-a-half minutes after the game was basically over).
So why did the game unfold the way it did on this side of the ball? The answer is pressure.
Seattle’s defense was able to generate it with 4-man rushes, intricate blitzes, and even their coverage. They also didn’t allow Maye to use his legs, containing him in the pocket and preventing many escape lanes in front of him. Overall, it was a brilliant plan by Mike Macdonald.
The Patriots had no answers up front and no answers with their route concepts or run game. Perhaps most importantly, Maye was off right from the start.
Did his injured right shoulder play a role? I’m sure it did. But his poor performance wasn’t just physical. He was too slow and deliberate moving through his reads. His internal clock didn’t match the pressure. He didn’t avoid negative plays when he could have. He made bad decisions. And he missed the few opportunities that were there.
But make no mistake about it, the Seahawks defense was the better unit on the field, and they had a large hand in making the Patriots and Maye play so poorly.
Here’s how they did it.
The first signs of dominance came on New England’s opening drive. The Patriots actually started off okay, getting two first downs early. Then they took a sack on 1st down to make it 2nd-and-20.
Watch left tackle Will Campbell (#66) get overpowered by Derick Hall:
Campbell’s struggles were a main theme throughout the night. He allowed 14 pressures according to NFL Next Gen Stats, the most allowed by any lineman in a single game this season. He didn’t quite seem the same this postseason after returning from a serious knee injury. But his struggles were just one small part of the equation.
Now this play above was not an ideal situation for Maye. Many of the situations he was in on Sunday were not ideal. But he repeatedly failed to make the best of those situations and minimize bad plays. I thought he had the opportunity to throw this ball into the ground after he got outside the pocket to keep New England in a manageable 2nd down. But he didn’t, and the Patriots got behind the chains.
This was significant because the next two plays were 2nd-and-20 and then 3rd-and-9. Seattle was able to sell out to stop the pass, bring their Dime personnel on the field (6 DBs), and kick cornerback Devon Witherspoon inside. This was the personnel grouping where they were able to give New England so much trouble with the blitz.
First, take a look at this 3rd-and-9 from the sideline angle. The Patriots motioned to a 3x1 formation. The Seahawks responded with a 2-shell look pre-snap (as they did for most of the night), 5 men on the line of scrimmage, Devon Witherspoon in the slot far away from the pressure look, and safety Nick Emmanwori lurking off the edge to the other side:
From the end zone angle, the Patriots set the protection vs. Seattle’s 5-man front. They had 5 linemen for 5 pass rushers and Rhamondre Stevenson accounting for Emmanwori if he blitzed:
Witherspoon was not even a consideration for the protection or Maye. But after the protection was set, he crept up to the line of scrimmage just before the snap and ultimately blitzed:
All 7 potential rushers appeared to be coming right after the snap, occupying all 6 blockers. The two pass rushers over the guards would then drop out to take away any quick throws underneath (if there were any):
No one was able to account for Witherspoon, who immediately pressured Maye and forced him to throw the ball away:
The blitz design was able to get a free runner on a 5-man rush against a 6-man protection. Great stuff by Mike Macdonald.
You also gotta love him playing cover-0 in the middle of the field on the Patriots’ opening drive:
From that angle, you can see that there were no hot options for Maye here. The Seahawks didn’t blitz a ton during the regular season, so it’s possible offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels was caught a little off guard early in this game.
On the Patriots’ next drive, they again found themselves in a 3rd-and-long situation (3rd-and-15 to be exact). The Seahawks came out in Dime personnel and brought a similar pressure look.
Their 5 big defenders (4 D-linemen and a linebacker) were on the line of scrimmage, Nick Emmanwori was blitzing off the weak side, and Devon Witherspoon would again blitz from distance from the 3-receiver side:
This look was a bit different as the Seahawks came out in a tilted front with 3 of their down linemen to the right of the center.
The center slid to that side since all 3 were likely to rush. They had 2 to take 2 on the backside and running back Rhamondre Stevenson was again responsible for Emmanwori off the edge if he came: