No doubt that the largest contingency of Seahawks fans outside of the State of Washington had to come from Raleigh, North Carolina and Madison, Wisconsin. NC State fellow alum Russell Wilson with supporting roles from Kicker Steven Hauskha and offensive lineman JR Sweezy didn’t just win a Super Bowl, they completely dismantled Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos 43 – 8… and the feeling from the game was that it wasn’t even that close.
On Russell Wilson. It seems that the only people who have a problem with NC State claiming the 3-year-starter and degree holder is the light blue academic-fraud types from down the road. Ask any other ACC rival and they could care less that NC State rightfully claims the quarterback. So much for the hoopla over “not our rivals”.
Wilson posted a very cool 18/25 for an unreal 72% completion rate with 2TD and 0INT with no real mistakes in unarguably the largest game of the young quarterback’s life. It’s quite a remarkable stat line considering he was matched up against future Hall-of-Famer Peyton Manning who surely will go down as one of the best, if not the best quarterback to ever play the game. Speaking of Manning, last night was his 12th playoff loss putting him alone at the top spot for the most all time playoff losses by a quarterback. It wasn’t a fitting ending to a legendary season that Manning produced and we’ve yet to see if that would be his final game – a complete dissemination of the NFL’s #1 offense by the NFL’s #1 defense.
The only real sadness I had last night was that, by the 2nd half, it was apparent that it would be really difficult for Russell to win the MVP award. And in the end he didn’t. It went, deservingly so, to linebacker Malcolm Smith who racked up 10 tackles, a forced fumble, an interception, and a touchdown. Not a bad day’s worth of work and surely MVP-worthy.
Not to be left out is Steven Haushka’s spotless performance who was a perfect 2/2 in field goal kicking and a perfect 5/5 in PATs giving him a total of 11 of the Seahawks’ points. He was also quite masterful in kickoffs as well. Had Haushka not booted the first kickoff well into the end zone coupled with a boneheaded move by Holliday to take that kickoff out of the end zone to put the ball at the 15-yard-line to start the game, then the first play from scrimmage may have never resulted in the safety that really took some wind out of the Broncos’ sails. On that play, the Seahawks broke a Super Bowl Record for the quickest score in a half… which was then tied by the Seahawks in the 2nd half with their kickoff return for a touchdown.
On the other end, Nate Irving made an incredible end zone play to knock loose a sure Wilson TD-pass which resulted in a field goal that put the score at 8-0, seemingly manageable for a quarterback like Peyton Manning to overcome. In the end, the Seahawks were just too much for the Broncos.
To prove even further that this was a #PACKED Super Bowl, take a look at the number of points scored by university:
NC State: 23
Wisconsin: 12
Tennessee: 8
Cal: 6
Florida: 6
Georgia Tech: 6
Stanford: 6
USC: 6
Washington: 6
Texas Tech: 2
UGA: 2
Those numbers alone should make every Wolfpack alum and fan proud even if you consider that all of that NFL talent knotted us nothing more than a Champps Sports Bowl victory in 2010.
But, from all of us from State Fans Nation and State Fans from around the world, we would like to extend a hearty congratulations to our World Champion Wolfpack brothers.
