On Oct. 2, the Seattle Seahawks were seen as a solid NFC West contender as they prepared to visit the Washington Redskins.
They flew home from the nation’s capital with a 2-2 record after a 20-17 overtime loss, and they haven’t looked back since.
They entered the playoffs with a 13-3 record as the No. 1 seed in the NFC and they have had two weeks to get ready for the sixth-seeded Redskins on Saturday.
In the second season of the second tenure of Joe Gibbs as head coach, the Redskins lost six of eight after beating the Seahawks. But they come to Qwest Field on Saturday with a six-game winning streak after last week’s 17-10 upset victory at Tampa Bay in the wild-card round.
Their early victory over the Seahawks could give the Redskins confidence, but it didn’t hurt the Seahawks.
“We realized what it takes to beat good teams,” Seattle running back Shaun Alexander, the NFL’s MVP, said of the Washington loss. “We got to see it in one crazy environment. D.C. has some loud, great fans. That was an eye-opener for us.”
The Seahawks rallied around Alexander and quarterback Matt Hasselbeck to win 11 straight games, raising hopes in the Pacific Northwest that they can win their first playoff game since 1984.
“[The Redskins] made us grow up as an offense,” Hasselbeck said. “They gave us a lot of different things to prepare for and it was a good learning experience for us. Sometimes you learn more about yourself through adversity than you do through success. There certainly was enough adversity to go around in that game.”
The Seahawks learned not to let an opponent hang around, missing a chance to win when Josh Brown’s 47-yard field-goal attempt hit the upright late in regulation. Nick Novak made a 39-yarder in overtime to win it for Washington.
While what happened on the Redskins’ field in October will play a role Saturday, so will countless practices held in Green Bay in the 1990s.
As the Packers’ head coach in the 1990s, Seattle coach Mike Holmgren tutored both of the game’s starting quarterbacks, Hasselbeck and Washington’s Mark Brunell, who had been Green Bay’s fifth-round draft choice in 1993. The Packers traded both because they had Brett Favre.
In 1995, Jacksonville entered the NFL as an expansion team and dealt for Brunell, who helped make the Jaguars contenders in their second season. After nine seasons in Jacksonville, he’s finishing his second season with the Redskins, but credits his time with the Packers for some of his development.
“We were very fortunate to be in that system and to be coached by that group of coaches,” Brunell said. “It was a great environment, great to come to right out of college. I was only there for two years, but it helped me so much.”
Holmgren and GM Ron Wolf drafted Hasselbeck out of Boston College in the sixth round in 1998.
“I was happy to be in the NFL, living the dream,” Hasselbeck said. “I’d get to play in the preseason when Brett would play a series or two and I got to play a quarter and a half and my whole family would come to town for the game. They never wanted tickets for the playoff games or the regular-season games, just the preseason games.”
In 1999, Holmgren moved to Seattle for the dual role of coach and general manager, though he was forced to give up the GM title in 2003 after failing to get the Seahawks to the playoffs in three of his first four seasons. In 2001 he traded for Hasselbeck, who started right away but still needed time to understand he wasn’t Favre and he had to stop challenging Holmgren.
“When I did a better job of being a little humbler and really being a better listener and being more coachable, that made our relationship better,” Hasselbeck said.
There’s one more thing that will make it better: the Seahawks’ first Super Bowl berth in their 30 seasons.
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tabannon@tribune.com
