National Football League

The Cowboys are good, but the Seahawks are (finally) the NFC's best team

Published Nov. 15, 2016 1:39 p.m. ET

Chris Chase

On a day in which the Dallas Cowboys survived a thriller in Pittsburgh to move to 8-1 on the season and finally solidified its quarterback depth chart, it was another NFC team that was putting the rest of the conference on notice. The Seattle Seahawks, a team that's struggled for a chunk of 2016 while still amassing a decent win total, made a fourth-down stand on Tom Brady's undefeated Patriots (the team was 3-1 in his absence) and showed the NFL there's now two teams to beat in the NFC and No. 1 on that list doesn't play in Texas.

There were seven lead changes in Seattle's 31-24 over the Pats (the same total as in the Dallas/Pittsburgh game -- the first time that's ever happened in NFL history), but the biggest play was the one not made, when Kam Chancellor engaged with Rob Gronkowski to prevent the all-world tight end from snagging a touchdown on the final Pats play of the game and gave Seattle the W.

Russell Wilson was sublime, going pass for pass with Brady. They both put on a show, throwing lasers and lofts with power and touch. It was two quarterbacks, one in his prime, the other supposedly well past it, dueling in primetime, with the younger coming out on top courtesy of his three touchdown passes (all to Doug Baldwin) and his defense making the big plays at the right time. The result of this would-be rivalry has now flipped from a Seattle win in 2012 to a New New England win in 2014 (Super Bowl XLIX) and back to a Seattle win in 2016. (The two teams aren't scheduled to play again until 2020. Any way we can get a Super Bowl rematch ASAP?)

This comes after an odd, disjointed start to the season in Seattle. The Seahawks were 1-1 after a loss to a Los Angeles Rams team that looked so bad the week before that 0-16 was very much on the table. Seattle then went on a three-game winning streak, but the first two wins were against the 49ers and Jets and the third came in a controversial way over Atlanta (Richard Sherman's pass interference no-call) that could, and probably should, have been a loss. So there were the Seahawks, a top-tier NFL team with a top-tier record but not even getting the grudging respect of a top team.

Wilson was nursing an injury and wasn't playing particularly well (even though you couldn't tell by his numbers, which were still respectable). The team hadn't figured out what to do without Marshawn Lynch. And the defense was playing with the peril of a "bend, don't break" style.

And then came the infamous Sunday night tie -- a 6-6 deadlock with the rival Arizona Cardinals that was far more offensive struggle than defensive battle, emphasis on offensive. There were 16 punts, half of which came on three-and-outs. There were blocks, missed kicks and a sloppiness not befitting teams who've been represented in the last three NFC Championship games. “We just couldn’t get in sync at all," Seahawks coach Pete Carroll said after the game even though he could have been talking about the whole season. One week later, when a loss to the up-and-down New Orleans Saints dropped Seattle's record to 4-2-1, the out-of-sync, beat-up team finally had a record reflective of its play.

When Seattle needed a goal-line stand to beat Buffalo last week, the perception of a team on the precipice was furthered. Vegas oddsmakers installed the Seahawks a 7.5-point underdogs on their trip to New England, a staggering total saying as much about Seattle's place in the current NFL pecking order as the Patriots'.

With one missed fade, all that's changed -- such is the beauty of the NFL. If that pass goes for a touchdown and Seattle goes on to lose, it would have been a "sky is falling" moment in the Pacific Northwest. Because it bounced harmlessly incomplete, Seattle is now a powerful 6-2-1 with two of those three blemishes a distant memory from a completely different team. The rest of the schedule is no cakewalk, with games against Jekyll and (Carlos) Hyde teams that play exquisitely one week and sloppy the next (Philadelphia, Carolina), teams always one step from being pushed over the edge (Green Bay, Arizona), division pretenders (Los Angeles, San Francisco) and Tampa (Tampa). But for now the 2016 Seattle Seahawks are who finally who we thought they were: the best team in the NFC.