Rams stand and deliver
By Jim Thomas
Of the Post-Dispatch
Saturday, Jan. 08 2005
SEATTLE - The Rams were in what's known as cover 4, a four-deep zone coverage.
Seattle wide receiver Bobby Engram lined up in the right slot, ran a curl
pattern toward the middle with 27 seconds to play and the Rams up by seven.
"We kind of knew the route because we practiced on it all this week," Rams
cornerback Jerametrius Butler said. "I jumped the route, and the quarterback
started scrambling, and the receiver starting scrambling."
Seattle quarterback Matt Hasselbeck's pass to Engram was low and outside but
appeared very catchable. Engram had a step on Butler.
"I couldn't see what happened," coach Mike Martz said. "It was just commotion
down there. ... Everybody was going crazy, so I thought, 'Oh, they scored.' And
then, our guys were jumping up and down, so I knew that was good."
Good as blue and gold. There was no catch. No overtime. Just a riveting 27-20
victory by the Rams on Saturday in a first-round playoff game at Qwest Field.
The Rams thus became the first 8-8 team in NFL history to win a playoff game,
and they did it by winning their third consecutive game against the Seahawks
this season.
"Yeah, we (beat) them three times this season, so I think we got their number,"
Butler said. "They've got problems now. I don't know what's going to happen to
them. But that's not my problem."
True. Any problems for Butler and the Rams ended when that Hasselback pass
bounced off Engram's hands and onto the turf. Incomplete.
In those frenzied moments, Butler didn't see the ball squirt out but knew it
was incomplete. Why?
"Because (Engram) didn't celebrate," Butler said. "He just rolled over."
Just a couple of minutes earlier, tight end Cameron Cleeland gave the Rams
plenty of reason to celebrate. He caught a 17-yard touchdown pass from
quarterback
Marc Bulger with 2 minutes 11 seconds to play, snapping a 20-20
tie.
"How about that?" Martz said. "It's the same play that we ran up in Denver in
the opener a few years ago (in 2002), and Kurt (Warner) just didn't make the
throw. Marc saw it, he knew he had a quick window. What a terrific catch that
was. That's got to be an all-timer, isn't it?"
Cleeland has been with the Rams for two seasons and had caught 18 passes total
- regular season and postseason. Then came Saturday.
After all of the things I've been through," an emotional Cleeland said. "The
multiple Achilles' (tendon) injuries. They say you can't ever play again. To
come back and do something like this in front of my family and friends - it's
too perfect for me right now. It's a great feeling, and I can't even put it
into words."
Cleeland, one of several Rams players from the Seattle area, made the catch in
front of about two dozen family members and friends. It came on a
third-and-three play in which Bulger made a play-action fake to Marshall Faulk
and then threw a high strike to the 6-foot-5 Cleeland down the seam of
Seattle's defense. The Seahawks got caught with their safeties playing up and
Cleeland was able to get inside position.
That proved to be the back-breaker in a back-and-forth contest. The Rams jumped
to an early 14-3 lead, only to find themselves down 20-17 early in the fourth
quarter on a Hasselbeck TD pass to Darrell Jackson.
The Rams took advantage of Seattle rookie safety Peter Boulware on two big
early pass plays, helping them take the 14-3 first-half lead. On the third play
of the game, Boulware came rushing up toward
Torry Holt in zone coverage. But
Holt raced right by him and caught a 52-yard pass from Bulger on a play that
carried to the Seahawks' 11.
Three plays and one Rams penalty later, Bulger hooked up with Holt again, on a
15-yard post route underneath cornerback Marcus Trufant. Seattle challenged the
call, but replays showed Holt kept a hand underneath the ball. The TD stood.
Then, on the first play of the second quarter, the Rams snookered Boulware once
again, this time on a 50-yard completion to Kevin Curtis that carried to the 5.
Bulger deftly looked away from Curtis to his left, and Boulware took the bait.
Curtis got behind Trufant, and Boulware couldn't recover in time.
"We just wanted to attack the safeties as much as we could in this game," Martz
said.
Two plays later, Faulk scored on a 1-yard run off right guard behind a good
lead block by fullback Joey Goodspeed.
But that 14-3 lead didn't last long. Seattle drove 84 yards on the ensuing
possession, with Engram scoring on a 19-yard TD pass from Hasselbeck. The Rams
appeared to have the drive stopped, when a tipped pass was intercepted by
DeJuan Groce with 8 1/2 minutes left in the second quarter.
But the interception was nullified on a facemask penalty against linebacker
Tommy Polley, who knocked the ball from intended receiver Maurice Morris but
strafed Morris' facemask in the process. Engram scored on the next play.
It was the first TD by the Seahawks against the Rams in more than seven
quarters, dating to the first half of the Oct. 10 meeting here. But it wasn't
their last. Josh Brown's second field goal of the game, plus the
Hasselbeck-to-Jackson TD pass, gave the Seahawks a 20-17 lead 71 seconds into
the fourth quarter.
Anybody worried on the St. Louis sideline? Apparently not.
"This is a resilient team," defensive end
Leonard Little said. "There wasn't
any doubt in our mind that we could win this game."
A Jeff Wilkins field goal, his second of the day, and Cleeland's TD, gave St.
Louis its first playoff victory since the 2001 season's NFC title game against
Philadelphia.
The Rams play either Philadelphia or Atlanta next weekend. They get Philly if
Green Bay defeats Minnesota on Sunday. They get Atlanta if Minnesota beats
Green Bay.
"This isn't the end of the season," Bulger said. "We're just at the point now
where we were last year."
(The Rams had a first-round bye last season before losing to Carolina in the
NFC semifinals.)
"Whoever we play is going to be tough," Bulger said. "But it's nice that we're
playing our best football of the year right now."