Seahawks’ playoff hopes are alive and well after beating the Eagles

Our experts at SB Nation were split this week on whether the Eagles or Seahawks would pull off a win at CenturyLink Field this week. The Eagles have been rolling and had jumped out to the best record in the NFL. But Seattle proved its season is far from over in Sunday night’s 24-10 win.

The Eagles came into the game on top of the entire NFL with 31.9 points per game. They couldn’t get more than three points on the board until the fourth quarter.

The Eagles did keep their streak of not allowing a touchdown on an opening drive alive. They held Seattle to a Blair Walsh field goal. But after that, the Eagles defense snapped its streak of no touchdowns allowed in a first quarter. Wilson hit Jimmy Graham for his first touchdown of the night to take a 10-0 lead. The Seahawks rolled right over the Eagles from that point on.

Wilson has carried the Seahawks offense all season, and Sunday night was no different. NBC even came up with a couple of fun little graphics to explain Wilson’s role in the offense:

That makes Wilson...

Wilson added 209 yards and three touchdowns to his passing totals for the season on Sunday night.

The first one was this beauty to Jimmy Graham:

The second was a 1-yard strike to Tyler Lockett:

The Eagles pulled within a touchdown of Seattle in the fourth quarter. Wilson didn’t blink. He found J.D. McKissic for a 15-yard touchdown to give the Seahawks a 24-10 lead. He did get away with a forward lateral, but it’s not his fault that Doug Pederson didn’t challenge the ruling on the field.

Wilson added 31 yards on the ground. And for once he didn’t have to carry that part of the offense on his own.

Wilson was Seattle’s leading rusher on the season coming into this game. Eddie Lacy, McKissic, and Thomas Rawls — the other three guys on Seattle’s depth chart at that position — had combined for 445 yards all season. So it’s no surprise that Seattle was ranked 21st in the NFL with 102.9 yards per game.

What is surprising is what Wilson has been able to do offensively without any support on the ground to balance things out. And maybe that’s changing.

Mike Davis had just 18 yards in his first game with the Seahawks, which was Week 11’s loss to the Falcons. Davis showed promise against the Eagles. He had 64 yards on 16 carries on Sunday night.

The Seattle defense is missing Kam Chancellor and Richard Sherman but still managed to harass Carson Wentz all night and made him look a little bit less like an MVP contender. Wentz finished with 307 yards, one touchdown, a pick and a fumble that bounced out of the back of the end zone for a touchback.

The Seahawks landed three sacks on Wentz and hit him a whopping 12 times. They held the Eagles second-ranked rushing offense in the league to well under its per-game average of 147.5. The Eagles managed just 98 yards on the ground.

Wentz did come up with some clutch plays, as he typically does. He somehow managed to deal a 51-yard dime to Nelson Agholor despite the fact that he was in the process of being taken to the ground by a Seahawks defender.

The play came on third-and-13 and gave the Eagles a necessary first down. It also set up the Eagles’ only touchdown of the night, a 27-yard strike from Wentz to Agholor, three plays later.

But the pressure the Seahawks brought all night and the way they slowed down the run game kept Wentz from getting into a rhythm. Seattle came up with some huge stops, which isn’t an easy task against the Eagles offense. Philadelphia turned it over on downs twice, and their next-to-last ended with Wentz throwing an interception to Byron Maxwell in the end zone.

It’s a tight playoff race in the NFC. The Eagles are 10-2, and they should be fine. But the Seahawks needed this win to keep their postseason hopes alive, and they got it.