Ken Walker III, Zach Charbonnet lead Seahawks to high-powered win over Panthers
With the franchise celebrating the 10th anniversary of this team's only Super Bowl win, the Seattle Seahawks emphasized the thing that got them there during the time of Marshawn Lynch and Beast Mode.
Running the football.
The running-back tandem of second-year pro Ken Walker III and rookie Zach Charbonnet combined for 143 yards and two touchdowns in Seattle's 37-27 victory over the visiting Carolina Panthers on Sunday at Lumen Field.
Walker finished with 97 yards on 18 carries and two touchdowns. The Michigan State product added another 59 receiving yards. Charbonnet helped to close things out late, totaling 46 yards on nine carries.
The Seahawks had struggled to effectively run the football through the first two weeks of the regular season. But behind a makeshift offensive line that at one point had just one projected starter from the start of the regular season in center Evan Brown, Seattle consistently created running lanes for both Walker and Charbonnet.
The Seahawks finished with a season-high 146 rushing yards on 33 carries for a 4.4 yard-per-carry average. Charbonnet's effort including a fourth-quarter run reminiscent of Lynch's bruising running style during his team's Super Bowl run, as he bounced Carolina defender Sam Franklin Jr. out of bounds near the goal line.
"You could see our style with our two guys," Carroll said. "They are uniquely different, but man, they both have got explosives in them. The physical run that you see Zach make, that's how we've learned about him to be, so when it happens again, he just reinforces it.
"I'm really fired up about those two guys."
Added Walker: "I feel like it's a great balance. Zach can make plays, just like I can make plays. Whichever one of us is in the game, I feel like we're going to produce."
Not only did the Seahawks run the football effectively, they also did a good job of stopping the run — something they struggled to do last season. The Seahawks entered Sunday's contest holding teams to 2.9 yards per carry. Defensively, Seattle held Carolina to just 44 total rushing yards and 3.1 per carry.
"That's huge moving forward," said linebacker Jordyn Brooks, who finished with nine combined tackles. "That was the biggest emphasis for the defense this offseason, was we've got to stop the run. Last year's performance as far as stopping the run was embarrassing, and not the standard that's been upheld here. So, that's the standard, and I think it's gotten better each week."
The crowd at Lumen stadium also got involved, creating an electric atmosphere that helped coax the Panthers into eight false starts, three short of a team record.
Carroll said he appreciated the crowd involvement, hearkening back to how the hostile environment was for the Super Bowl team being celebrated a decade ago. Super Bowl MVP Malcolm Smith raised the 12th man flag before the game, and former defensive co-captain Red Bryant gave a pre-game speech to the current players after practice on Saturday, the day before the game.
"What a great factor," Carroll said about the crowd noise. "It felt like what it feels like to be here at Lumen. That was a thrill for our young guys who haven't heard it like that. And they understand why we talk about it so much, and why it's a factor."
The passing game was also plenty productive in the win. Geno Smith completed 23 of his 36 passes for 296 yards, with a touchdown and an interception. D.K. Metcalf led the team in receiving with 112 yards on six receptions.
[Do you want more great stories delivered right to you? Here's how you can create or log in to your FOX Sports account, follow your favorite leagues, teams and players and receive a personalized newsletter in your inbox daily.]
At 2-1 after the win, the task for Carroll and the Seahawks is to keep the momentum going when the Seahawks hit the road to face the New York Giants next week.
"The first game was such an outlier, I can't even imagine how that happened," Carroll said. "But to go finish 60-plus minutes last week, and to come back this week, that's really a big statement for us. And we're going to need it all the way down the schedule.
"It's a young team that coming together and finding itself, and we can really make something of that."
Eric D. Williams has reported on the NFL for more than a decade, covering the Los Angeles Rams for Sports Illustrated, the Los Angeles Chargers for ESPN and the Seattle Seahawks for the Tacoma News Tribune. Follow him on Twitter at @eric_d_williams.