Game recap

Seahawks @ Cardinals

2026 Wk 2 · ARI 7, SEA 31

Smith-Njigba scored three times, once from 82 yards out, and Arizona managed 151 yards at home.

FanIQ Research · September 21, 2026 · 7 facts, every one from the play-by-play

Three touchdowns for Smith-Njigba, only the eighth three-score receiving game by a Seahawk since 1999. Two of the eight came against Arizona.

Rare

Drew Lock hit Jaxon Smith-Njigba from 82 yards out at 12:38 of the first quarter, then from 7 yards in the third and 12 yards in the fourth. Smith-Njigba finished with 9 catches on 11 targets for 155 yards. Lock's full line was 19 of 26 for 235 yards, 3 touchdowns, no interceptions and one sack. The 82-yard score is the fourth-longest touchdown pass Seattle has thrown since 1999, behind plays of 90, 87 and 84 yards.

Seahawks with 3+ receiving touchdowns in a regular-season game, 1999-2026

Season	Week	Opp	Player	Rec	Yards	TD
2015	12	PIT	Doug Baldwin	6	145	3
2015	14	BAL	Doug Baldwin	6	82	3
2016	10	NE	Doug Baldwin	6	59	3
2020	3	DAL	Tyler Lockett	9	100	3
2020	7	ARI	Tyler Lockett	15	200	3
2021	17	DET	DK Metcalf	6	63	3
2023	13	DAL	DK Metcalf	6	134	3
2026	2	ARI	Jaxon Smith-Njigba	9	155	3

Seattle touchdown passes of 80+ yards, 1999-2026 (regular season and playoffs)

Season	Week	Game	Passer to receiver	Yards
2008	9	PHI at SEA	S.Wallace to K.Robinson	90
2010	12	KC at SEA	M.Hasselbeck to B.Obomanu	87
2021	7	NO at SEA	G.Smith to D.Metcalf	84
2026	2	SEA at ARI	D.Lock to J.Smith-Njigba	82
2002	4	MIN at SEA	T.Dilfer to S.Alexander	80
2003	12	SEA at BAL	M.Hasselbeck to D.Jackson	80
2013	8	SEA at STL	R.Wilson to G.Tate	80
2014	16	SEA at ARI	R.Wilson to L.Willson	80
2015	12	PIT at SEA	R.Wilson to D.Baldwin	80

Why it matters. Three-touchdown receiving games are scarce for this franchise: eight in 28 seasons, and only four players have done it. Smith-Njigba's came with 155 yards and one explosive play, which is the profile of a receiver who beats a defense both deep and near the goal line rather than a red-zone specialist. Lockett's 200-yard, three-score game in 2020 was also against Arizona, so this defense has now given up two of the eight.

Arizona gained 151 yards, its fewest in a home game since 1999.

Anomaly

Fewest offensive yards by Arizona in a regular-season home game, 1999-2026

Season	Week	Opponent	Result	Yards	Plays
2026	2	SEA	ARI 7, SEA 31	151	47
1999	8	NE	ARI 3, NE 27	166	61
2004	2	NE	ARI 12, NE 23	167	51
2021	10	CAR	ARI 10, CAR 34	169	53
2000	10	WAS	ARI 16, WAS 15	173	44
2005	7	TEN	ARI 20, TEN 10	173	54

This game, both offenses (pass and run plays)

Team	Plays	Yards	First downs	EPA/play	Success%
ARI	47	151	8	-0.325	31.9%
SEA	67	381	22	0.134	46.3%

Arizona ran 47 pass and run plays and averaged 3.2 yards on them. Jacoby Brissett's 95 passing yards came on 28 attempts, and the Cardinals ran 17 times for 70 yards. Seattle out-gained them by 230 yards and had 22 first downs to 8. The only other entry on this list with a play count in the 40s is the 2000 Washington game, which Arizona won.

Why it matters. A franchise-low home yardage number under a closed roof, with no weather to blame, says the offense was solved rather than unlucky. The 8 first downs are the mechanism: Arizona did not sustain drives, so its defense was on the field for 67 Seattle snaps. A 230-yard gap is hard to reach on turnovers alone, and the Cardinals only gave the ball away once, on Julian Love's third-quarter interception.

Jacoby Brissett threw 28 passes for 95 yards, one of five such games by any passer since 2020 and the lowest of his career.

Rare

Brissett completed 17 of 28 for 95 yards, 3.4 yards per attempt, with a 2-yard touchdown to Trey McBride and an interception by Julian Love. McBride caught 8 of his 10 targets for 41 yards, which means the other 18 attempts produced 54 yards. Arizona's longest completion of the game went 9 yards.

Passers with 28+ attempts and 95 or fewer yards, 2020-2026 regular season

Season	Week	Passer	Team	Opp	Comp/Att	Yards	TD	INT
2023	1	Joe Burrow	CIN	CLE	14/31	82	0	0
2023	18	Bailey Zappe	NE	NYJ	12/30	88	0	2
2024	1	Caleb Williams	CHI	TEN	14/29	93	0	0
2025	18	Brandon Allen	TEN	JAX	17/30	72	0	1
2026	2	Jacoby Brissett	ARI	SEA	17/28	95	1	1

Brissett's fewest passing yards in a regular-season game with 25+ attempts (58 such games)

Season	Week	Team	Opp	Comp/Att	Yards	TD	INT
2026	2	ARI	SEA	17/28	95	1	1
2017	17	IND	HOU	15/25	114	1	0
2019	16	IND	CAR	14/27	119	0	0
2019	12	IND	HOU	16/25	129	0	0
2019	2	IND	TEN	17/28	146	3	1
2022	1	CLE	CAR	18/34	147	1	0

Why it matters. In 58 regular-season games with at least 25 attempts, Brissett had never finished under 114 yards, so 95 is a new floor for a veteran whose value is supposed to be a steady one. The cohort table shows how unusual the volume-to-yardage combination is: four other passers in seven seasons, and two of those were a rookie's debut and a Week 18 game. The shape here was short throws into coverage, with 17 completions averaging 5.6 yards and nothing longer than 9.

Arizona ran 14 offensive plays after halftime, one of six second halves that short by any team since 2020.

Split

Both offenses by half (pass and run plays)

Team	Half	Plays	Yards	EPA/play	Success%
ARI	1st	33	107	-0.169	36.4%
ARI	2nd	14	44	-0.694	21.4%
SEA	1st	30	190	-0.147	40.0%
SEA	2nd	37	191	0.362	51.4%

Second halves with 14 or fewer pass and run plays, 2020-2026 regular season

Season	Week	Team	Game	Result	2nd-half plays
2023	1	SEA	LA at SEA	LA 30, SEA 13	14
2023	2	LV	LV at BUF	BUF 38, LV 10	13
2023	11	TEN	TEN at JAX	JAX 34, TEN 14	13
2024	15	PIT	PIT at PHI	PHI 27, PIT 13	11
2025	15	BAL	BAL at CIN	BAL 24, CIN 0	14
2026	2	ARI	SEA at ARI	SEA 31, ARI 7	14

Arizona's second half was 10 passes for 16 yards and 4 runs for 28. Seattle answered with 25 runs for 119 yards after the break, up from 15 for 43 in the first half, and its efficiency flipped from minus 0.147 per play to plus 0.362. Since 1999 only 34 of 13,990 regular-season team-games have had 14 or fewer second-half snaps. The one Baltimore entry on the 2020s list was a win; the other five were losses by 14 or more.

Why it matters. A 14-play half is what happens when three-and-outs meet a ball-control opponent: Arizona's 3 conversions on 12 third downs ended possessions fast, and Seattle's 25 second-half runs kept the ball once it had the lead. The direction of the two EPA lines is the real story, since Arizona got worse after the break while Seattle got better. Halftime adjustments cut both ways, and here they cut the same way twice.

Tied 7-7 at halftime with Seattle's win probability at 46.6 percent, then 24 unanswered points.

Trend

Scoring plays

Qtr	Clock	Team	Play	Score after (ARI-SEA)
1	12:38	SEA	Lock 82-yard pass to Smith-Njigba	0-7
2	15:00	ARI	Brissett 2-yard pass to McBride	7-7
3	12:31	SEA	Lock 7-yard pass to Smith-Njigba	7-14
3	6:52	SEA	Myers 33-yard field goal	7-17
4	12:44	SEA	Lock 12-yard pass to Smith-Njigba	7-24
4	1:15	SEA	Barner 1-yard run	7-31

Seattle win probability at three checkpoints

Point in game	Score (ARI-SEA)	SEA win prob
Last Seattle snap of the 1st half	7-7	50.7%
Opening kickoff of the 3rd quarter	7-7	46.6%
End of the 3rd quarter	7-17	91.2%

Regular-season games tied at halftime and decided by 24+ points, 2020-2026

Season	Week	Game	Halftime	Final	Margin
2020	16	CHI at JAX	10-10	CHI 41, JAX 17	24
2021	16	NYG at PHI	3-3	PHI 34, NYG 10	24
2023	14	HOU at NYJ	0-0	NYJ 30, HOU 6	24
2026	2	SEA at ARI	7-7	SEA 31, ARI 7	24

Seattle's first possession produced the 82-yard score, Arizona answered on the first play of the second quarter, and the score did not change for the next 17 and a half minutes of game clock. Then it moved fast: Smith-Njigba's second touchdown at 12:31 of the third, Julian Love's interception on the next Arizona series, a Jason Myers field goal, and two fourth-quarter touchdowns. Since 1999, 697 regular-season games were tied at halftime; 24 of them, 3.4 percent, ended with a margin of 24 or more, and this is the fourth since 2020.

Why it matters. A halftime tie with a sub-50 percent model read for the eventual winner is the textbook shape of a game decided by second-half execution rather than a talent gap. The win probability moved from 46.6 to 91.2 percent inside one quarter, on a touchdown, a takeaway and a field goal, which is about as fast as a tied game can be settled. The historical share says this shape shows up in about 3 percent of tied games.

Arizona's offense came in ranked 23rd in 2025 EPA per play. Against Seattle it produced minus 0.325, below what any 2025 offense averaged for a full season.

Comparison

Offensive EPA per play, 2025 regular season (top 3, both teams, and last)

Rank	Team	Plays	EPA/play	Success%
1	NE	1017	0.159	48.5%
2	LA	1056	0.145	51.8%
3	BUF	1065	0.136	48.5%
13	SEA	997	0.033	46.3%
23	ARI	1074	-0.019	43.0%
32	LV	942	-0.215	37.6%

This game versus each team's 2025 regular-season baseline

Team	Game EPA/play	2025 EPA/play	Game 3rd down	2025 3rd down	Game runs	2025 runs/game
ARI	-0.325	-0.019	3 of 12 (25.0%)	95 of 224 (42.4%)	17	21.4
SEA	0.134	0.033	7 of 13 (53.8%)	86 of 202 (42.6%)	40	28.9

Both teams converted third downs at about 42 percent last season. Here Arizona went 3 of 12 and Seattle 7 of 13. Seattle also ran 40 times against a 2025 average of 28.9 per game, the biggest departure from its own profile on the sheet, while Arizona's 17 rushes sat below its 21.4.

Why it matters. Comparing a team to its own baseline separates a bad matchup from a bad team. Arizona's minus 0.325 is about 0.31 per play below its 2025 average and 0.11 below the worst full-season offense of 2025, so the game was an outlier even against Arizona's modest standard. Seattle's plus 0.134 is a solid game rather than a transformation; the difference was 40 carries turning the clock into a weapon once it led.

A sixth straight Seattle win in Glendale, by the largest margin in the series since 2015.

Milestone

Seahawks at Cardinals, every meeting since 2018

Season	Week	Score	Winner
2018	4	ARI 17, SEA 20	SEA
2019	4	ARI 10, SEA 27	SEA
2020	7	ARI 37, SEA 34	ARI
2021	18	ARI 30, SEA 38	SEA
2022	9	ARI 21, SEA 31	SEA
2023	18	ARI 20, SEA 21	SEA
2024	14	ARI 18, SEA 30	SEA
2025	4	ARI 20, SEA 23	SEA
2026	2	ARI 7, SEA 31	SEA

Seahawks vs Cardinals games decided by 24+ points (49 meetings in the database, 2002-2026)

Season	Week	Score	Margin	Winner
2012	14	SEA 58, ARI 0	58	SEA
2003	2	ARI 0, SEA 38	38	SEA
2015	17	ARI 6, SEA 36	30	SEA
2014	16	ARI 6, SEA 35	29	SEA
2005	3	SEA 37, ARI 12	25	SEA
2009	6	SEA 3, ARI 27	24	ARI
2026	2	ARI 7, SEA 31	24	SEA

Arizona's last home win over Seattle was 37-34 in 2020. Since then Seattle has won six straight at State Farm Stadium, though four of the six were by 10 points or fewer. This 24-point margin is tied for the sixth-largest in 49 meetings and the largest since Seattle's 36-6 win in Week 17 of 2015. Six of the seven blowouts in the series belong to Seattle.

Why it matters. Divisional streaks at one venue are unusual because the schedule guarantees a visit every season regardless of form, so six straight road wins over the same opponent reflect a real gap rather than scheduling luck. The margin matters more than the streak here: the previous five were mostly close, and a 24-point road win inside the division is the kind of result that shows up in tiebreakers and point differential all season.

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