Takeaways from Seahawks 17-13 loss to Bengals

A 17-13 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday will feel like a significant missed opportunity for the Seattle Seahawks.

The defense held Joe Burrow, Ja"Marr Chase and a talented Bengals offense to just 72 total yards gained over their final nine possessions of the game. Meanwhile, the Seahawks had four possessions inside the Cincinnati red zone in the second half and came away with just three points of their own.

Geno Smith was intercepted twice in the second half and sacked twice inside the Bengals 10-yard line in the final four minutes of the game as the Seattle offense was unable to deliver the scoring punch needed to find the end zone and a victory. The Seahawks were just 1-of-5 in the red zone, 5-of-12 on third down, and 0-for-2 on fourth down as they were unable to come up big in the clutch moments of the game.

"All the red zone stuff is where they got us, where we needed touchdowns," head coach Pete Carroll said. "Our numbers will look bad there in the red zone, but we were so close to winning that football game. Give them credit, they hung in there and got it, but I loved the way we played today. I know we had our penalties and there’s stuff to get better at, but that’s a competitive group. They fought their butt off today, both sides of the football. It’s going to help us down the road. We’re going to keep playing hard, keep playing tough, and make it hard on everybody we play"

The Seahawks did a lot of things right in Cincinnati. That's what makes the loss feel like a squandered opportunity, especially with the San Francisco 49ers and Philadelphia Eagles each losing their first games of the year.

A road loss to a good AFC team isn't that big of a deal on its own as it has low impact on potential tiebreaking scenarios at the end of the year. But with a five-week gauntlet coming later in the season with two games against the 49ers, a road trip against the Los Angeles Rams, and games against the Dallas Cowboys and Eagles, getting another win under their belt now would have been a big accomplishment.

Alas, it didn't come to be.

Here are the takeaways from Seattle's loss to the Bengals.

– Red zone/third down failures were significant.

Head coach Pete Carroll mentioned it himself. The inability to convert in the red zone and some of the misses on third (and fourth) downs that helped make that a reality were the biggest story of the game for Seattle offensively.

"That was a game to win, right there," Carroll said. "We came out here on the road, their crowd going crazy, and we’re right there. We’re inside the 10 a bunch of times to win the game. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get it in."

The third down issues have been an ongoing problem throughout the year. Seattle ended Sunday's game as the second-worst team in the NFL at converting on third down at just 28.9 percent. Even going just 5-of-12 on third downs on Sunday will actually raise the percentage for the season to 31.6 percent. However, that's not the type of consistency the Seahawks want on offense.

Those shortcomings helped fuel the lack of success in the red zone as well.

"We didn’t finish. We didn’t finish in the red zone. I think that’s pretty obvious," quarterback Geno Smith said. "I thought we moved the ball well pretty much all day and stalled out down there. We’d have to actually look at the film to see exactly what happened but just from thoughts after the game it felt like we didn’t finish and didn’t execute as good as we did in the open field."

Seattle's offense did become fairly one-dimensional through the game. Ken Walker III was held to just 62 yards on 19 carries with a touchdown. Throw in two carries to Zach Charbonnet and the Seahawks managed just 3.2 yards per carry on 21 overall carries for the running backs.

That led to another problem that contributed to the offensive shortcomings.

– Offensive line play faltered noticeably in critical moments.

Seattle's offensive line has done a tremendous job of performing despite numerous absences due to injury over the last several weeks. However, Geno Smith took a season-high four sacks and the lack of running game success helped blunt to offense's overall productivity.

While at least one of the sacks was Smith's fault for holding the ball too long, Smith was hit a total of 13 times in the game with four sacks. When Smith had to scramble with five minutes left to play trailing by four, if he had one more second in the pocket he could have found a wide open Jaxon Smith-Njigba open up the left sideline. On the final play of the game, Smith was hit by B.J. Hill before he could get a pass attempt for Colby Parkinson away into the end zone.

Sam Hubbard ended up with five hits along on Smith for the Bengals.

Smith took the high road and shouldered as much of the blame for the offensive performance as he could. He took blame for both of the interceptions he threw and said that his offensive line played great.

"I feel like my guys and the defense played a tremendous game. I feel like the offensive line played a tremendous game. You felt Charles Cross out there when he got back in the game, he did a tremendous job. I’m so proud of Jaxon and the way he played. So proud of DK (Metcalf) and the way he played as well as Tyler (Lockett), man. I felt like the guys deserved to win today. Obviously, I didn’t do my best job today to get that done. So those are things I put on myself, I lay right on my feet right, on my shoulders and I look forward to the next opportunity."

Damien Lewis was out of the lineup with Phil Haynes sliding to left guard and rookie Anthony Bradford in the lineup again at right guard. Right tackle Jake Curhan – who has started four games in place of an injured Abe Lucas at right tackle – was having trouble with Hill and Hubbard throughout the game.

Throw in the lack of ground game success and it was a lackluster performance for an offensive line group that truly has played surprisingly well given all the injuries since the start of the year.

– Defense makes adjustments, delivers three tremendous quarters.

Pete Carroll's comments about loving the way the team played despite the loss almost certainly revolve around the success of the defense for most of Sunday afternoon.

The Bengals offense carved up the Seattle defense over the first two drives of the game. Cincinnati racked up 142 yards of total offense on 20 total plays and authored two touchdown drives as it appeared Sunday's game could turn into a shootout.

Instead, the Seahawks defense rebounded and pitched a gem from that point onwards. The Bengals managed just 73 more yards of offense gained over their final eight real possessions of the contest (excluding a final kneel down to end the game). Those drives resulted in six punts, an interception from Tre Brown, and a field goal that came on a three-and-out after Smith's second interception in the fourth quarter.

"I thought the guys played about as good as they could play on the defensive side of the ball. They lit it up in the second half with pressure, didn’t make a yard on the turnover they got, and forced the field goal. The defense gave us every chance," Carroll said.

The Seahawks managed three sacks of their own with Jarran Reed, Dre'Mont Jones and Boye Mafe each getting a chance to take Burrow down. Brown's interception came on a perfectly played throw for Chase up the sideline. Brown then came up big again with a pass break up on a third down pass for Tee Higgins on Cincinnati's final substantive drive that gave the Seahawks' offense one last chance for the game-winning score.

"It’s that chemistry we’re building — that chemistry and that trust in each other, seeing how to play off each other and with each other. Just understand that when you look at the guy to your left and your right, that you can trust them," Mafe said.

Cincinnati finished with just 214 yards of total offense and averaged just 4.0 yards per play. Joe Mixon was held to 38 yards on 12 carries as the Bengals rushing attack never was able to get going. The longest rush of the day allowed by Seattle was five yards.

"The D-line has been doing a really good job this year stopping the run. Everybody’s been averaging 2.5, 2.3? (Eds note: 3.2 yards per carry, 79.2 yards per game) That’s Top-5, Top-3 in the NFL. We knew what those guys were about, we just had to come play our game."

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