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# Rapid Reaction: Seahawks Survive Titans’ Frenzied Comeback Bid, Secure 30-24 Road Win
- URL: https://www.emeraldcityspectrum.com/rapid-reaction-seattle-seahawks-tennessee-titans-survive-frenzied-comeback/
- Published: 2025-11-23T21:19:56.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-08T05:57:11.000Z
- Author: Corbin Smith
- Tags: Analysis, Game Day, Seahawks, Leonard Williams, Sam Darnold, Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Ken Walker III, Rashid Shaheed

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Fortunate to see the clock reading triple zeroes with a lead, the Seattle Seahawks survived an unexpected late push from the one-win Tennessee Titans, escaping with a 30-24 road win to improve to 8-3 on the season.

Playing much better football than he did last weekend, Sam Darnold threw for 244 yards and threw a pair of touchdowns to Jaxon Smith-Njigba, who racked up 167 receiving yards on eight catches lighting up Tennessee’s undermanned secondary. Though the defense struggled to get stops late with five fourth down conversions allowed, four different Seahawks produced sacks on Titans quarterback Cam Ward, with Leonard Williams leading the way with four quarterback hits on the afternoon.

Here are five quick takeaways from Seattle’s six-point road win at Nissan Stadium:

**1\. Feasting on ravaged secondary, Smith-Njigba continues his one-man assault on Seahawks and NFL record books.**

Another week, another jaw-dropping performance from Smith-Njigba, who once again emerged as a show stopper in Nashville. Early in the second quarter, after a quarterback sneak resulted in a false start, Darnold laid a dime into the receiver’s hands on a deep corner route, boxing out the defender behind him, breaking a tackle, and jogging into the end zone for a 63-yard strike. Opening the second half, he struck again, this time reeling in a 56-yard catch that put him within 15 yards of DK Metcalf’s single season franchise record, a mark that didn’t stay atop the list for long. Only a few plays later, he came open between two defenders in the end zone for an easy 13-yard touchdown catch, and on the next drive, he hauled in a quick curl for an eight-yard gain to push past his former teammate.

Away from reaching the mountain top for receiving yards in a single season in franchise history with over 160 receiving yards against an injury-plagued Titans secondary, Smith-Njigba extended his streak of 11 consecutive games with 75 or more yards to open the season, the longest mark in NFL history. He’s now one of only three players with 11 or more games in a row at any point in a season hitting that mark, while he also extended his own team record with an eighth 100-yard receiving performance. The extraordinary has become ordinary with the third-year wideout, who remains well on pace (2,023 yards) to dethrone Hall of Famer Calvin Johnson Jr. for the league’s single season receiving yardage record.

**2\. A strong, albeit far from perfect, bounce back performance from Darnold airing it out under center.**

Coming off one of the worst games of his football career with four interceptions thrown in a 21-19 loss to the Rams, Darnold rediscovered his mojo against one of the NFL’s worst defenses, completing north of 60% of his passes with a robust 9.4 yards per attempt aided in large part by the two 50-plus yard connections with Smith-Njigba. Most importantly, he didn’t have a single turnover for the first time since Week 6 in Jacksonville, doing a better job of taking care of the football after battling interception issues with seven picks in the past four games while still being aggressive seeking explosives downfield. But that didn’t mean that there weren’t close calls scattered in there on Sunday either.

On Seattle’s first series, Darnold tried to squeeze a third down pass to Ken Walker III on an out route, and the running back thankfully got a piece of the football to stop cornerback Marcus Harris from intercepting it. With no other players between Harris and the end zone, if he picked off, that could have been six points for Tennessee. Two drives later, Darnold again put a bit too much confidence in his arm, this time inside the opposing 10-yard line. Facing second and goal, he rolled out to his left and looked to have some room to run, but instead tried to thread the needle to tight end AJ Barner with two defenders on him in the end zone. The pass got tipped up into the air for what seemed like a lifetime, only for it to fall harmlessly to the turf for an incompletion that certainly generated sighs of relief on the Seattle sideline. He also had a dead duck to Rashid Shaheed early in the fourth quarter that was so wobbly it ended up not being catchable for cornerback Darrell Baker Jr., leaving plenty of room for improvement.

**3\. After an underwhelming start, Seattle generally played inconsistent defense with a few splashy sequences from Cam Ward.**

Demonstrating a bit of jet lag, or at minimum adjusting to the absence of multiple starters, including linebacker Ernest Jones, the Seahawks came out flat on the opening drive of the game, allowing Ward to wiggle free for multiple scrambles out of the pocket. This included a 14-yard run on the second play from scrimmage where his pump fake got linebacker Patrick O’Connell off his feet, allowing the rookie quarterback to bolt past him to easily move the sticks. The drive ended up stalling in the red zone after 15 plays with O’Connell chasing down Ward on the sideline for a third down sack, but the Titans did chew up more than nine minutes of clock time and took a 3-0 lead for a brief moment.

From there, Seattle settled down nicely, forcing back-to-back punts with Byron Murphy II sacking Ward to end one of those drives and then stuffing Tennessee on 4th and 1 with nose tackle Brandon Pili bottling up Julius Chestnut at the line of scrimmage. But after a three-and-out to open the third quarter, the No. 1 pick kept things interesting in the second half, engineering a 63-yard touchdown drive for the Titans capped off by a leaping touchdown run on a quarterback keeper. On the next possession, he evaded Demarcus Lawrence in the backfield and rolled out to his right, throwing the ball back over the middle as he fell out of bounds to rookie Xavier Restrepo for a first down, but the Seahawks buckled up and forced another turnover on downs to make those heroics a moot point. Ward responded by finding Dike for his second touchdown of the day, making it a one score game inside a minute to play after the Seahawks allowed multiple fourth down conversions on the drive, a clear negative that will need to be addressed moving forward.

**4\. Shaheed brings some much-needed juice in the return game to set up scoring drives.**

Now three games into his time with the Seahawks, Shaheed continues to try and find his way on offense building chemistry with Darnold, as he didn’t record a single catch with two targets and added a short run on a wildcat play. Even with significant snaps, he has only caught three passes for 30 yards since a deadline deal to acquire him from the Saints. That transition has been frustrating thus far with the quarterback and his new receiver yet to truly connect and offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak yet to truly unlock him in the same system he performed well in previously in New Orleans.

With that said, the dynamic playmaker still found a way to have a substantial impact in Sunday’s contest in place of Tory Horton on punt return, returning a pair of punts in the first half for 20 and 19 yards, setting up Seattle with outstanding field position. The second one by Shaheed advanced Darnold and company inside the Tennessee 30 to kick off a new drive, leading to a Jason Myers field goal to push the lead to 13-3 in the second quarter. His explosiveness and suddenness have been more than evident blowing past oncoming coverage defenders over the past few weeks and his presence helped turn the field over and create points without him being a factor on offense yet.

**5\. Not the best day for injuries, particularly on special teams, where absences became noticeable.**

If there’s a downside that comes with Seattle’s eighth win, the team will need some extra ice for the flight back home after losing several players to injuries on Sunday. Standout special teams player Chazz Surratt, who has been a major difference maker on numerous units for coordinator Jay Harbaugh, suffered an apparent ankle injury in the first quarter and immediately was ruled out. Moments later, the Seahawks announced running back George Holani (hamstring) would not return either, leaving another significant void on the coverage teams that eventually came back to bite the visitors when rookie Chimere Dike returned a punt 90 yards for six points at the 10-minute mark in the third quarter, cutting the lead back down to 13 at the time.

A defense already without Jones and his backup Tyrice Knight also took another hit coming out of halftime, as safety Ty Okada, who has been starting in place of Julian Love for much of the season, exited with an oblique injury. Veteran D’Anthony Bell replaced him in the lineup, which coincided with giving up a couple of touchdown drives in the second half to make the game way too close for comfort. Heading into a Week 13 battle with Minnesota, all of these injuries will be worth monitoring closely, though help could be on the way with Love eligible to be activated from injured reserve next week.