Seahawks’ Drew Lock steps up to beat Patriots | Instant impressions

Three instant impressions after the Seahawks opened defense of their Super Bowl title with a 13-10 win over the Patriots:

In Lock we trust

The nature of the NFL means it’s almost a certainty that at some point the backup quarterback will be needed. Not always. Not always for an extended period either. But it’s rare to get through a 17-game season without asking the backup to step on the field in some capacity.

It’s also rare — maybe unheard of with rare exception — that the backup is needed after just five plays of the season.

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For the moment, the Seahawks are Drew Lock’s football team. Depending on the severity of Sam Darnold’s right hip injury, it could be a couple of weeks that Lock is in charge. It could be from now until January. Hips can be troubling.

The Seahawks have a backup-quarterback situation that is enviable around the league. Lock is a backup for a reason and Darnold clearly won the job before the start of the 2025 season. We all know what happened next.

But in the hierarchy of backups, Lock is about as solid as can be asked for. He’s got experience. He seems to have learned from the past. If he has to be the guy for the foreseeable future, the pedigree is there to take on the challenge.

And in the moment of Wednesday’s opener, how Lock grew into the game was impressive. Being thrust onto the field after one drive led to a disjointed first-half performance by the offense. There were still some head-shaking moments in the second half but for the most part, Lock started to find a groove that meshed with what new offensive coordinator Brian Fleury was calling.

Lock went 10-of-14 for 136 yards and a touchdown in the second half alone. If that’s what can be expected moving forward, maybe the Seahawks can survive if Darnold is out for an extended period.

Always have a safety plan

No Nick Emmanwori. No Ty Okada. No Coby Bryant or Riq Woolen, either.

Julian Love is still around. So is Josh Jobe. And good thing Rodney Thomas II is as well.

Thomas and Love made two of the biggest plays on a night that the Seahawks defense didn’t dominant to the same level as the Super Bowl but were still incredibly stingy. New England finished with 277 total yards and averaged only 4.1 yards per play.

But to rally from a 10-0 deficit, the Seahawks needed a couple of big plays and they came from their two safeties. Thomas made the first one, rotating quickly after Nehemiah Pritchett was initially beat to deflect Drake Maye’s pass for Romeo Dobbs. The deflection eventually ended in the hands of Pritchett for the first turnover of the season.

On New England’s next drive, Maye foolishly tried to force a throw and Love closed so quickly, it looked like the pass was intended for him. It took one game for Love to match his interception total from all of last season.

And Jobe, while not a safety, provided the final moment intercepting Maye in the end zone with a gorgeous toe-tap along the sideline.

Not a bad start for the entire Seattle secondary.

Flags flying

For the most part, the Seahawks were a disciplined team on their way to the Super Bowl. Not perfect as a few games last season showed, but far from being egregious with the flags.

That will certainly be a point of discussion for coach Mike Macdonald this week after the Seahawks were penalized 10 times for 98 yards. They were big ones, too. A roughing the punter. A 34-yard pass interference call. An illegal shift that erased a touchdown pass and forced Seattle to settle for a field goal.

Not all the flags seemed legit, but plenty did.

Openers are almost always sloppy, especially now with starters almost never playing in the preseason. This should — or better — improve.