Super Bowl champions Seattle earned a chance at an NFL title repeat with a stunning 28-22 overtime playoff triumph over the Green Bay Packers.
Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson shook off four interceptions and hit Jermaine Kearse with a game-winning 35-yard touchdown pass Sunday on the opening possession of the extra period to give Seattle the victory in the National Football Conference title game.
The Seahawks, who trailed 16-0 at halftime and 19-7 early in the fourth quarter, scored two touchdowns in less than a minute in the final period of regulation in their remarkable rally.
A year after humbling Denver in last season’s Super Bowl they will return to the NFL’s championship showcase in suburban Phoenix, Arizona, on February 1.
Seattle will play the New England Patriots, who cruised past Indianapolis 45-7 in the American Football Conference title tilt on Sunday.
“I’m honored to be on this team. We’re going to the Super Bowl again” a tearful Wilson said as he was mobbed on the field.
“Four interceptions and just keep playing,” Wilson added. “The guys just kept believing in me.”
Wilson’s one-yard touchdown dash with 2:09 left in the fourth quarter pulled the Seahawks within 19-14.
Seattle then recovered the ensuing onside kick, as Steven Hauschka’s effort bounced through the hands and off the helmet of the Packers’ Brandon Bostick.
Seattle’s Chris Matthews seized the ball at midfield to launch the Seahawks on a drive capped by Marshawn Lynch’s 24-yard touchdown run and Luke Willson’s catch of a two-point conversion heave from a madly scrambling Wilson.
That gave the Seahawks a 22-19 lead — their first of the game — with 1:25 remaining in regulation.
The Packers responded, with quarterback Aaron Rodgers guiding a drive that ended with Mason Crosby’s fifth field goal of the game, a 48-yarder that knotted the score at 22-22 with 14 seconds remaining.
Seattle won the overtime coin toss and Wilson capped their 87-yard opening drive with a textbook toss over the middle to Kearse, whose only catch of the contest was the game-winner.
Seattle, already the first Super Bowl champions to win a playoff game the following season since the 2005 Patriots, will now try to become the first team to win back-to-back NFL crowns in a decade — since the Pats won Super Bowls 38 and 39.
Such were Wilson’s struggles that the Seahawks’ first touchdown pass wasn’t even thrown by the quarterback.
Instead, it came on a fake field goal, when punter Jon Ryan — who holds the ball on field goal kicks — connected on a surprise 19-yard strike to backup offensive lineman Garry Gilliam with 4:44 remaining in the third quarter that made it 16-7.
– Packers’ missed opportunities –
The Seahawks still couldn’t really get rolling, however.
Early in the fourth, Green Bay stretched their lead to 19-7 with a 57-yard field goal from Crosby.
With less than three minutes left in regulation, the Seahawks’ hopes of a Super Bowl return looked dim.
Then came their two quick strikes and the Packers, who got a solid game from Rodgers despite the quarterback’s calf injury, were left to regret missed opportunities in the first half.
Green Bay wasted a scoring chance on the first possession of the contest when Rodgers was intercepted by Byron Maxwell in the end zone.
And the Packers settled for field goals on their next two possessions after Seattle turnovers before Rodgers connected with Randall Cobb on a touchdown pass that made it 13-0 as the first quarter ended.
“It’s going to be a missed opportunity that we’re probably going to think about the rest of my career,” a dejected Rodgers said. “We were the better team today and we played well enough to win and we can’t blame anybody but ourselves.”