49ers Uncharacteristic Third Down Woes Mean NFC Goes Through Seattle

On a night where any style of win would have gotten them a bye and the number one seed, the 49ers were held to 180 total yards of offense at home and an ugly loss instead.

After the 49ers were able to keep Thomas Morstead off the field for a stretch that included 21 drives earlier in the year, the Seahawks finally were able to get the 49ers' potent offense off the field. By holding them to 2 for 9 on third downs and 0 for 2 on fourth downs.

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This led to only 9 first downs and only 3 points in the biggest game of the year, at least for now.

The 49ers came into the game with a league-high 51 percent third-down conversion rate. Counting the previous six games only, they had a jaw-dropping 59 percent conversion rate on third downs.

The Seahawks defense came in with a league-best third-down defense, allowing only 32 percent conversions, and looked every bit as strong as that during this matchup. All the stats led to the fewest regular season yards in the eight-year Shanahan era in 173 and a statement made to the rest of the league that Seattle are for real.

On the other side of the field, in a season where their defense had to do with Warner and Bosa for big stretches, the Seahawks, behind big nights from Walker and Jaxon Smith-Njigba, secured home-field advantage throughout the playoffs.

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Even Christian McCaffrey in a campaign where he had exceeded 2000 yards from scrimmage coming in, dropped a Purdy pass while trying to put on the cape in the open field. The ball then promptly went the other way for an interception. It just wasn’t their night, but unfortunately, the timing of the night couldn’t be worse.

Minus a twenty-yard completion to Kittle, the 49ers started the fourth quarter, and the 49ers' offensive numbers looked even more hideous.

Based on how the Rams game shakes out, the 49ers could still be lucky enough to face the NFC South winner in the wildcard round, who will be coming in with 8 wins. But you never want to back into the playoffs with an ailing all-world left tackle and arguably the best tight-end in football both on the injury report.

It remains to be seen if the 49ers can shake the ugly taste of this game which was lost on third down, and get back on track with very little time to do so.