Pete Carroll blames Seahawks kicker for strange overtime play

There were baffled looks among many who were watching Sunday’s Seattle-St. Louis game when Seahawks kicker Steve Hauschka attempted what appeared to be an onside kick at the start of overtime. The kick traveled 14 yards before the Rams recovered it, giving them great field position.

Turns out it wasn’t supposed to be an onside kick at all.

“No, no,” Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll explained after the game. “We just didn’t execute that. That’s not what was supposed to happen. We just didn’t execute properly on the kick. We were kicking the ball in a certain area of the field. We didn’t hit it right, and so we just mis-hit it.

Hauschka was supposed to hit a bloop kick farther downfield, which sometimes causes confusion on the return team, leading to the kicking team recovering the ball. But that didn’t happen.

“The result wasn’t planned there,” Hauschka said. “I mis-hit that kick. We were supposed to kick it downfield further than that, but yeah I mis-hit it. I take the responsibility on that, putting our team in a bad situation there starting overtime.

“There was something we saw on them that we wanted to try to take advantage of, but obviously didn’t do that.”

The Rams kicked a field goal and ended up with a 34-31 victory.

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