Cardinals vs. Seahawks: History between the two teams goes back to Seattle's NFL debut

How far back does history go  between the Cardinals and Seahawks? To September 12th, 1976 which marked the first regular season game of the new expansion team known as the Seattle Seahawks. The St. Louis Football Cardinals are now long gone of course as well as the Seattle Kingdome (imploded to the delight of many), however the 30-24 Cardinals victory still stands and so do the rushing yards of Jim Otis and Terry Metcalf (140 and 113 respectively).

Seattle resided in the NFC West their first season (14 games), playing all thirteen conference foes plus one game against the other new franchise team Tampa Bay Buccaneers, before swapping conferences and repeating the same formula. The Seahawks then stayed put in the AFC West until the most recent conference re-alignment in 2002, which accounts for how the series saw only six matchups between the two teams previous to becoming division rivals (the Cardinals won the first five).

The Cardinals were also happy to help inaugurate Seattle's new Seahawks Stadium in September 2002 (a 24-13 victory that saw Thomas Jones rush for 173 yards), which was soon to be renamed Qwest Field before changing yet again to Century Link Field in 2011.

The teams have never played in the postseason nor do they share past Pro Bowlers, but of the notable players that played for both teams one that comes to mind would be Dave Krieg -- recruited to Arizona by that renowned QB guru Buddy "There's a winner in town" Ryan. Not surprisingly, that experiment lasted only a year before Krieg moved on to rank #3 on the all-time NFL fumbles list (153).

Current players with ties to both teams includes Cardinals John Carlson, Paul Fanaika and coach (and former great Cardinals running back) Stump Mitchell. Seahawks players who've formerly played in Arizona include A.J. Jefferson and O'Brian Schofield.

There have been many highlights in the all-time series that finds the Cardinals leading 16-14 that include:

* Four touchdown receptions by Roy 'Jet Steam' Green in a 1983 St. Louis Cardinals victory (33-28). The game also saw Neil Lomax complete 21 passes on 27 attempts with four TD's and no interceptions that earned a 145.3 passer rating.

* Steve Beuerlein's 431 yards passing and 3 touchdowns at the Kingdome in 1993 -- the first of three consecutive wins to close out the final season for a team known as the Phoenix Cardinals (30-27). Gary Clark caught 12 of team's 34 receptions for 152 yards and a touchdown.

* A seventy-two yard interception return by Lorenzo Lynch (courtesy John Friesz) wins the game in overtime at Sun Devil Stadium in 1995 (20-14). The Arizona Cardinals leading receiver that day was Larry Centers with 9 catches for 73 yards.

* Neil Rackers converts three 50+ yard field goals in one game (55, 55 and 50) in a 25-17 victory in the desert in 2004. Rackers enjoyed kicking against the Seahawks with 8 of his 26 career 50+ yard field goals coming at their expense. Emmitt Smith rushed for 106 yards for the Arizona Cardinals that day.

* Kurt Warner tosses for 32 of 44 with 395 yards passing, much of which went to Anquan Boldin and Larry Fitzgerald with 13/186 and 10/151 catches and completions respectively in a 2008 Cardinals win (26-20).

Perhaps the biggest game in the history between the two teams occurred in week 16 last year when the Cardinals snapped the Seahawks fourteen-game home winning streak (17-10). In Bruce Arians' biggest win as a full-fledged head coach to date, the Big Red defense held the Seahawks to a mere 192 total yards while the Cards offense rushed for 143 yards and set the stage for Michael Floyd's first career game-winning catch from Carson Palmer (in his first game against his former college coach Pete Carroll). The game also marked QB Russell Wilson's first loss at CenturyLink Field in two seasons as a starter.

The Cardinals are set to fly to Seattle and snap on the chin-straps Sunday with intent on seeing that history repeats itself.