The Seattle Seahawks knew they were in. After beating the San Francisco 49ers in the Divisional Round (to be more clear, the team thrashed San Francisco), Mike Macdonald's squad was just two victories from being a Super Bowl winner. The next step is, of course, the NFC Championship game.
On Sunday, Seattle learned that they would be playing the Los Angeles Rams after LA beat the Bears in cold Chicago in overtime. The Bears are an ascending team and should be good for many years, but they simply aren't the complete team that the Rams are. Not yet.
The NFC Championship matchup is what every NFL fan should have wanted. LA and Seattle were the best teams in their conference for much of the season, and played two tight games in the regular season. The second meeting in Week 16 was arguably one of the best regular season games in recent memory.
Seattle Seahawks will play the Los Angeles Rams in the NFC Championship game
For 12s' sakes, the hope is that the game isn't quite as close as the Seahawks' 38-37 overtime victory when the team went for two at the end. Had Seattle not converted, the season and the playoffs would look differently than they do now.
The next trek the Rams will take is traveling to Seattle on Sunday, January 25, to play a 3:30 pm PT game. The contest will be televised and streamed by FOX, and just like in the Divisional Round, the broadcast crew will consist of Kevin Burkhardt (play-by-play) and Tom Brady (analyst), with Erin Andrews and Tom Rinaldi reporting from the sidelines.
No two teams could know each other better than the Seattle Seahawks and Los Angeles Rams do. That should mean that whichever team executes better will be moving on to the Super Bowl.
The narratives of the game will most likely be that Rams QB Matthew Stafford is better than Seahawks QB Sam Darnold in the big games, so don't be surprised when many national pundits pick Seattle to lose.
As long as the Seattle Seahawks defense continues to operate at a high level, though, the team can (and maybe should) defeat anyone. A Super Bowl victory might not be too far away.