The Green Bay Packers picked off Russell Wilson four times in the NFC Championship. With five minutes left and the Seattle Seahawks down 12, Wilson was intercepted for the final time by safety Morgan Burnett, who slid down to end the play rather than try to run the ball out for better field position. The decision ultimately proved costly when the Packers went three-and-out and opened the door to a Seahawks comeback.
Morgan Burnett doesn’t regret interception slide against Seahawks
Even if in retrospect it backfired.
The play has been heavily dissected in the time since the Seahawks’ 28-22 overtime win. Along with tight end Brandon Bostick’s botched onside kick recovery and head coach Mike McCarthy’s decision to settle for field goals twice at the Seattle 1-yard line, Burnett’s slide contributed to the largest comeback victory in conference championship history.
Still, even with a night to consider the ramifications of his slide, Burnett unequivocally stands by his decision, per the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.
“I don’t take anything back that I did,” Burnett said. “It’s easy to sit here after and say ‘we should have did this, we should have did that.’ If the outcome was different, we wouldn’t even be talking about it.”
“I was trying to secure the catch, I got the ball in my hand and the main thing was just gaining possession of the ball. And I got the ‘no mas’ signal, which means ‘no more, no return, get down’ and secure possession of the ball, give our offense the ball.”
In fairness to Burnett, when he slid following the interception, it appeared as though the Packers had iced the game. In those situations, a defender sliding to avoid contact is fairly common. Given how well Green Bay’s offense had played up to that point in the game, it’s hard to blame him for wanting to guarantee his team possession. The decision only received significant criticism after the Packers lost the game.
Still, if Burnett tries to return it, perhaps the Seahawks never get the ball back, or if they do there’s too much ground to cover in the remaining time. Unfortunately for Burnett and the Packers, they’ll never know what could have been.
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