Seahawks Instant Reaction: Defense dominates in shutout vs Vikings

Seattle Sports voices weigh in on the Seattle Seahawks' 26-0 home victory over the Minnesota Vikings.

Nov 30, 2025, 4:11 PM Updated: 5:38 pm

Watch: Instant Reaction: #Seahawks vs. #Vikings Week 13 | 1 min

The Seattle Seahawks are in control of their own destiny with just five games to go in the season.

Seattle’s defense forced a season-high five turnovers, including a pick-six from Ernest Jones IV, on its way to its first shutout in a decade as the Seahawks thumped the Minnesota Vikings 26-0 on Sunday at Lumen Field.

Seahawks win: Observations | Stacy Rost’s Takeaways | Recap | Box Score

Thanks to some help in the form of a Carolina Panthers upset win over the Los Angeles Rams earlier in the day, the Seahawks (9-3 record) moved into a tie with the Rams record-wise for first place in the NFC West. Los Angeles currently holds the tiebreaker due to winning the first head-to-head matchup between the teams earlier this month, but they meet again on Dec. 18 for a critical showdown in Seattle.

Here are the instant reactions to Sunday’s win over Minnesota from some of the voices of Seattle Sports, including Seahawks Radio Network analyst Dave Wyman’s thoughts in the video at the top of this post.

Brock Huard – Brock & Salk (6-10 a.m.)

#Seahawks shutout the #Vikings 26-0 in Week 13, @BrockHuard shares his instant reaction to the victory.

RECAP 📰: https://t.co/yUO3fVwuBo pic.twitter.com/wXSvVr4cMk

— Seattle Sports (@SeattleSports) December 1, 2025

Mike Salk – Brock & Salk

Max Brosmer versus this Seattle defense was simply not a fair fight. Maybe one day he will turn himself into an NFL quarterback. But on this day, he looked very much like an undrafted player that was starting games at University of New Hampshire not too long ago. And while he wasn’t ready for prime time, the Seahawks’ defense looked like Cheers in the ‘80’s. That unit is special.

They did everything. They got to Brosmer early and often. They picked him off four times. They stopped the run. They forced fumbles. And they rendered the fearsome receiving duo of Justin Jefferson and Jordan Addison totally impotent and irrelevant. They pitched a shutout, outscoring the Minnesota offense 7-0.

And while the offense continues to leave plenty of questions unanswered, it played the complimentary game Mike Macdonald asks of it. Heck, if they had simply taken a knee on every down and punted it away, they still would have won this game.

One more week where you can get away with sloppy play on offense before a late-season gauntlet against Indianapolis, Los Angeles, Carolina and San Francisco. Things are getting real!

WHAT JUST HAPPENED‼️ 85 yards to the house.#ProBowlVote + @ernestjones

📺: @NFLonFOX pic.twitter.com/AHKHvIhouE

— Seattle Seahawks (@Seahawks) November 30, 2025

Bob Stelton – Wyman & Bob (2-7 p.m. weekdays)

What an outstanding day for this defense! It made an undrafted rookie look like an undrafted rookie. It forced five turnovers on the day – four picks and one fumble recovery – while sacking Max Brosmer three times.

Ernest Jones had a great day as well adding to his team lead in interceptions with two picks in this one, including an 85-yard pick-six. The Hawks’ defense made sure that The Vikings offense did absolutely nothing well in this one.

It was a different story for the Seahawks’ offense, which was forced to grind it out all game. The star of the day was Jason Myers, who went 4 for 4 on field goals.

The O-line had a very rough time picking up the Vikings’ blitz as they harassed Sam Darnold for most of the game, sacking him four times and forcing a fumble. It certainly wasn’t a brilliant day for the offense, but the defense was there to pick up the slack enough to shut the Vikings out. It was all good enough for the Hawks to pick up their ninth win of the season.

HE'LL TAKE THAT. That makes two in a day for @ernestjones 🔥#ProBowlVote + @ernestjones

📺: @NFLonFOX pic.twitter.com/M92OgAx4xf

— Seattle Seahawks (@Seahawks) November 30, 2025

Mike Lefko – Wyman & Bob

This was about what you expected and hoped the Seahawks’ defense would do against an undrafted rookie quarterback making his first career start. That doesn’t mean it takes away from how impressive the performance was on that side of the ball, especially from the defensive line. The Vikings had absolutely zero run game, and DeMarcus Lawrence played game-wrecker on the fourth-and-1 that led to the Ernest Jones pick-six and changed the course of the game.

Credit Riq Woolen and the Seahawks’ secondary for completely taking Justin Jefferson out of the game as well. That is a receiver who usually gets his receptions regardless of the quarterback he has throwing him the ball, but there was nothing there all day for the Vikings star receiver.

The Seahawks’ offense did sputter and there might be enough of a sample size over the last three games to say they are officially in a rut right now. The Vikings’ frenetic blitzing early led to four sacks in the first 25 minutes of game action, including a costly turnover deep in the Seahawks’ own territory, and for the first time all season a team was able to figure out a way to contain Jaxon Smith-Njigba and subsequently shut down the explosive plays from the Seattle passing attack.

That is the biggest question for me coming out of this game and looking forward to the final five games of the season: How does Klint Kubiak and the offense adapt now that the last few opponents have found ways to slow down the explosive elements that were a staple for this team earlier in the season?

In the immediacy of this game, though: A very solid win overall, especially when you see the Rams stumble and open the door for the No. 1 seed in the NFC.