When the Seahawks opened training camp in late July, it was common to see Seattle's veteran defensive linemen working with the young offensive linemen they were competing against to offer pointers between plays.

Defensive tackle Leonard Williams might beat guard Grey Zabel with a pass rush move in a one-on-one drill, then pull the rookie aside to explain how he did it, or veteran outside linebacker DeMarcus Lawrence might coach up a young tackle between reps.

Almost half a year later, it was Zabel returning the favor to assist Williams on a big fourth-down sack in Seattle's 41-6 divisional round victory over the 49ers.

For most of that game, the Seahawks were pressuring 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy and making life miserable for San Francisco's offense in general, but Seattle's pass rushers were not able to get to the elusive Purdy for any sacks. That changed in the third quarter when, with the 49ers going for it on fourth-and-2 just past midfield, Williams blew past 49ers right guard Dominick Puni and buried Purdy for a 14-yard sack. The Seahawks would turn that short field into a Jason Myers field goal extending the lead to 27-6 on their way to a dominant win.

And while it was Williams' combination of athleticism, power and pass-rush savvy that ultimately made the play happen, he was quick to give an assist to Zabel following the game. At one point earlier in the game, Zabel noted to Williams that 49ers center Jake Brendel was regularly sliding toward Williams to help protect the A gap (between the center and guard), so Zabel offered up a simple but elegant solution: attack the B gap between the guard and tackle.

"I've got to give a shout out to the rookie, Grey Zabel, actually," Williams said. "He's a smart kid. Since camp, since OTAs, we've been going back and forth communicating, giving each other tips on what works, what doesn't work. Sometimes it's good to get insight from a guy on the other side of the ball, and he said to me at one point that he can tell I was getting a slide—the center sliding to me a lot—and he was like, 'Hey, why are you taking the inside move, when the slide is coming to you? You should just try to burn the B-gap.' So that whole drive, I was taking off, trying to burn the B-gap, and it worked.

"I went up to him and thanked him, for sure."

That sack highlighted not just Zabel's football intelligence as a rookie, not to mention his confidence to approach a veteran of Williams' stature with some in-game advice, but it also showed Williams' willingness to learn and adapt, even when that advice is coming from a rookie, 11 years into a standout career.

"It was funny, because even D-Law tried to give me crap about it on the sideline, he's like, 'What, a vet learning a from a rookie?'" Williams said. "But that goes back to another thing Coach Mike (Macdonald) talks about, old-school principles, new-school methods. I'm not above myself enough to not take advice from someone, and that's how this team is. If somebody has good insight, we're all willing to learn from each other, willing to grow. It doesn't matter what year I am, I'm learning from a young guy. The game is changing, always adapting. I learned a slogan a long time ago when I was young—adapt or die. That's how this game is, you've got to always adapt."

The Seahawks have gotten to this point where they are one of the final four teams standing for a number of reasons, from the talent on the roster to the coaching and scheme in all three phases to, as Macdonald likes to call it, the "shocking effort" players show on the field. But there are other, harder to quantify reasons behind their success, not the least of which is the closeness of the team that players have cited throughout this season as a key to their success. And to Macdonald, Williams' sack was a perfect example of that closeness paying real dividends in a game.

"That's an awesome story," Macdonald said. "What a great microcosm of how our team has gotten to this point. It's really symbolic of those relationships that we've built. Then for Leo to have the humility to seek out that type of advice and take it from a rookie—to the layman's perspective, it's like, 'Why would he do that?' But then you start to dig in and realize that those guys have been working together for a long time, and they've developed a cool relationship. I think it's really, really, really cool."