The Seattle Seahawks produced a devastating defensive display to beat the New England Patriots and claim their second Super Bowl victory.
Two of the NFL’s strongest defences battled it out in Sunday’s showpiece and the Seahawks emphatically came out on top to win 29-13 at Levi’s Stadium.
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It was a defensive performance for the ages and Briton Aden Durde played a pivotal role, becoming the first overseas coach to win America’s biggest game.
Seattle’s 46-year-old defensive coordinator has helped create the most-feared defence in the NFL, which has become known as ‘the Dark Side’, and they showed why on American football’s biggest stage in Santa Clara, California.
New England’s second-year quarterback Drake Maye narrowly missed out on this season’s Most Valuable Player award but was stifled by the Seahawks, who claimed six sacks, forced three turnovers and scored a defensive touchdown.
After Seattle led 9-0 at half-time, Maye’s first turnover resulted in the game’s opening touchdown for tight end AJ Barner early in the fourth quarter.
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Linebacker Uchenna Nwosu then returned an interception for a 45-yard touchdown, while Jason Meyers kicked a record five field goals as Seattle denied the Patriots a record seventh Super Bowl win.
«We were the better team, we’re the best team. We loved each other, we believed in each other and now we’re champions,» said Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald.
«We went to the dark side tonight, we love our players, they made it happen. They made it come to life and we won the game.»
Kenneth Walker became the first running back to be named Super Bowl MVP since Terrell Davis in 1998 after his 135-yard performance [Getty Images]
How Seahawks stifled MVP contender Maye
Most of the 70,823 crowd seemed to favour Seattle, who came into the game as narrow favourites, and their win also means that quarterback Sam Darnold has completed his redemption story after being written off as a starting NFL quarterback.
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The Seahawks are Darnold’s fifth team in his eight-year career – and third in three years – but in his first year in Seattle the former third overall draft pick has won the game’s biggest prize.
The 28-year-old has been haunted by a comment he made as he struggled in a game against the Patriots in 2019, when he said «I’m seeing ghosts», but Darnold has now exorcised those demons.
Instead, it was Maye who suffered a nightmare when confronted with the fast, physical defence that Durde and coach Macdonald have fashioned in their two seasons together in Seattle.
Such is the breadth and depth of the threat it carries that Devon Witherspoon claimed a sack from cornerback. He, Derick Hall and Rylie Mills only registered 2.5 sacks between them all season but all three got to Maye in the first half.
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The Patriots earned just four first downs before the interval and 52 yards in total. Some cruel folks on social media even joked that Bad Bunny gained more yards as he carried a ball during his half-time show.
Hall’s second sack forced a fumble which was recovered by Byron Murphy, who also sacked Maye twice as the Dark Side wrote themselves into Seattle folklore alongside the Legion of Boom, the defence that lead the Seahawks to their previous Super Bowl win in 2014.
Seattle’s defence conceded the fewest points in the regular season (17.2 per game) [Getty Images]
