2012 Arizona Cardinals Rewind: Week 1 Review of Win vs. Seahawks

Seattle Seahawks @ Arizona Cardinals
September 9, 2012
Week 1

20-16 Arizona (1-0)

The Cardinals entered this match up with some doubt surrounding them. They had just wrapped up a quarterback battle in which John Skelton had beat out Kevin Kolb for the starting job. The NFL was also starting something new, and that was replacement ref's. The Referees Association were in a contract dispute with the NFL so Roger Goodell was forced to go out to his local Footlocker and hire them. Anywho... Let's get to the review.

Stats:

Passing:

Seattle Seahawks:	Arizona Cardinals:
Russel Wilson 18/34 153 Yards 1 TD 1 INT	John Skelton 14/28 149 Yards 1 INT
	Kevin Kolb 6/8 66 Yards 1 TD

Rushing:

Seattle Seahawks:	Arizona Cardinals:
Marshawn Lynch 85 Yards	Andre Roberts 15 Yards

Receiving:

Seattle Seahawks:	Arizona Cardinals:
Braylon Edwards 5 Catches 43 Yards	Larry Fitzgerald 4 Catches 63 Yards
Zach Miller 3 Catches 40 Yards	Andre Roberts 5 Catches 54 Yards 1 TD
Sidney Rice 4 Catches 4 Yards 1 TD	Early Doucet 3 Catches 37 Yards

First Half:

The Cardinals would kick the ball off to start the game. On the fourth play of the drive Patrick Peterson would be called for Pass Interference, moving the ball 28 yards up field putting the Seahawks in good field position to open up the game. The Defense stiffened and halted the Seahawks advance at the 32 yard line. Steve Hauschka would come out to attempt a 50 yard kick, only to have it blocked by Calais Campbell.

The Cardinals would take over, only to have their drive end on their second play from scrimmage following a Ryan Williams fumble.

The Seahwks took advantage of the mishap and drop the ball from the Arizona 42 to the nine yard line, where Hauschka would make the 27 Yard Field goal.

(3-0 Seattle)

The Cardinals would take over, and with the help of a Richard Sherman PI call would move the ball to the Seattle 3 yard line before stalling (and of course we threw two times both being incomplete). Jay Feely would boot the 21 yard FG and we would knot it up at three.

(3-3)

The next drive would be riddle with penalties on both sides. Adrian Wilson would be called for a neutral zone infraction on the first play from scrimmage, on the next play Sam Acho and Clinton McDonald would fight, offsetting the penalties, but the Paris Lenon sack on Russel Wilson still stood. Two plays later Reggie Walker would be called for roughing the passer, tacking on 15 yards. One play later Marshawn Lynch would be called for holding saving a five yard sack, and turning it into a 10 yard loss. The drive would end with a John Ryan 46 yard punt.

Arizona would take the lead moving from the Arizona 42 to the Seattle 1 where LaRod Stephens-Howling would run up the gut for the one yard score.

(10-3 Arizona)

The rest of the first half would be scoreless, and harmless until the end where Russel Wilson was picked off by Adrian Wilson, who would lateral it to Patrick Peterson, who if not for a shoestring tackle, would have scored.

Second Half:

Arizona would get the ball to start and immediately went 3 and out, but on a 47 yard punt by Dave Zastudil, would pin the Seahawks inside their own 15 to start.

The Seahawks would make it outside the twenty before a strip sack of Russel Wilson would give the Cardinals the ball on the Seattle 17. Skelton would be picked off by Kam Chancellor, but Chris Clemons was lined up offside reversing it. They would not make it into the endzone, but Arizona would kick a field goal.

(13-3 Arizona)

The Seahawks would take the ensuing kickoff and return it 83 yards, where Russel Wilson would toss a 10-yard TD to Sidney Rice, closing the gap.

(13-10 Arizona)

Things would begin to unravel for Arizona. On their first play on the next drive John Skelton would toss a pick giving the Seahawks excellent field position, where they would then kick a 47-yard FG to tie up the game.

(13-13)

The rest of the third quarter would be without incident and would be until the Cardinals first possession in the 4th. Zastudils punt was returned to the Arizona 16 and back to back penalties would kill a chance for a touchdown, but opened the door to Hauschkas' 39-yard FG to take the lead.

(16-13 Seattle)

John Skelton would move the Cardinals on the next drive, but an injury would force him out of the game and Kevin Kolb to enter. Kolb would then take the team despite a holding call down the field, where he would hit Andre Roberts for a six-yard TD.

(20-13 Arizona)

The following drive, would be the weirdest and most controversial in Week 1 NFL history. It started off like any other. Russel Wilson coming out with hopes of leading his team to that last second come back. The Cardinals would hold them at the Arizona 27 yard line for a desperate fourth down attempt... But a PI call against Patrick Peterson would spark several questionable calls henceforth.

The PI call was already controversial because it appeared Sidney Rice had his hands in Peterson facemask, thus offensive PI, but Peterson held back attracting the penalty. The Cardinals would then force two incompletions, and an injury to Doug Baldwin. Seattle had already used up two timeouts earlier in the drive and with the game under 2:00 minutes the injury should have been the final timeout.

But this was missed by the officials and following a two yard run by Marshawn Lynch, Pete Carrol would "call his third and final timeout". He knew he had no more, but took advantage of the poor officiating. (Why, I ought to wipe that smug disgusting little smirk off his cheating face... Uhhh anyway back to the review) The officials gave it to him and play resumed about 10 minutes later after they had to check.

30 seconds remained in the game and Peterson, Adams, and Gay would close out the game with forced in-completions to end the Seahawks potential comeback drive.

Arizona would rise to 1-0 on the season, and Kevin Kolb would be named the starter until John Skelton was healthy.