Seahawks Celebrate NFC West Title & No. 1 Seed While Also Knowing 'We've Got More Work To Do'

The Seahawks finished off the winningest regular season in franchise history with a 13-3 win over the 49ers. Now, after a first-round bye, they’ll get to work trying to finish the job.

Jan 04, 2026 at 09:00 AM

John Boyle

Seahawks.com Senior Reporter

The Seahawks celebrated the win vs. the 49ers at Levi's Stadium in Week 18.

SANTA CLARA, Calif.—Not long after the Seahawks beat the 49ers to secure an NFC West title and the conference's top seed, Mike Macdonald put on a new hat that read "2025 NFC WEST DIVISION CHAMPIONS" as he prepared to address his team.

"It feels good to put this hat on, doesn't it?" Macdonald yelled.

Macdonald eventually made his way to a postgame press conference with the party, complete with victory cigars and loud music, continued on.

"I'm really proud of our team," Macdonald said. "You can hear them in there—they love each other, man. It's so much fun to go to work every day and to coach this team. It's an absolute honor to coach these guys. I just talked to (Aden Durde) on the plane. I was like, 'I don't want this to end.' Ultimately, the season's going to end at some point, but I just want to keep going. I want to do whatever this is. Every day has been a massive blessing, and I love these guys."

The Seahawks are hoping their season ends back at Levi's Stadium, which will host the Super Bowl next month, and their road to that ultimate goal became a little easier thanks to Saturday's win. By beating the 49ers 13-3 behind a dominant defensive effort, the Seahawks improved to 14-3, the first 14-win season in franchise history, and in doing so they secured not only the division title, but also the NFC's top seed, which comes with a first-round bye and homefield advantage in the playoffs. Instead of a trip to Carolina or Tampa Bay next week, Seattle's fate had they lost, they get to rest up and get ready to host a divisional round game.

That's the path three previous Seahawks teams have taken in the postseason, and in all three of those seasons, they reached the Super Bowl.

"Of all the things we've been thinking about over the last 30 minutes or so, that's definitely a point of pride that we can have at least one home playoff game in front of the 12s," Macdonald said. "They've been dynamite this year. They've been absolutely incredible. We're really excited to be able to stay home."

While now isn't the time for Macdonald to appreciate what he and his team accomplished this season, it's worth examining before the focus shifts from regular season to postseason. Since taking over as Seattle's head coach, the Seahawks have a 24-10 record, including a league-best 20-5 over their last 25 games. This year's team not only won the most games and road games in franchise history, it also posted a league-best point differential of plus-191 that was the best in team history. The Seahawks also scored the most points in franchise history with 483 while at the same time fielding arguably the NFL's best defense, a group known as "The Dark Side" that the best Seattle has seen since the Legion of Boom defenses that led the Seahawks to consecutive Super Bowl last decade.

"We're here today as number one seed because of Mike," linebacker Ernest Jones IV said. "Not just the way he calls it, but the community that he's building in that locker room. We play for each other. We fight for each other. I've said this before, we got here to this point, and it started last year. It started through those ups and downs that we had last year when I came here. It started then and we were able to pick it up this year and just keep rolling."

As Macdonald spoke to the media, the party continued in the locker room, and perhaps nobody was appreciating it more than veteran defensive tackle Leonard Williams, who in his previous 10 seasons, the first eight and a half of which were spent with the Jets and Giants, reached the postseason only twice, never winning more than 11 games in a season. Shirt off and victory cigar in his hand, Williams savored the moment while recognizing that there's still work to do.

"It's incredible," Williams said. "I don't want today to end, honestly. I was hanging out I the locker room for a long time, that's probably why I'm the last one here (for a postgame press conference) right now. It's incredible. I've been playing for a really long time, this is the closest team I've ever been on, the most winning season I've ever been on, and overall, the job's not done. That's another thing I love about this team so much—people are celebrating, but in the middle of the celebrations, you're hearing people say, 'We've got more work to do, we've got to move onto the next one.' Not having that complacency is really special.

"The victory cigars were pretty awesome. I couldn't really breathe in there at one point, but it didn't really matter. My excitement and joy was taking over the smoke in my eyes and not being able to breathe. It was just beautiful to see my team celebrating and seeing everyone happy from all the hard work we've been putting in."

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For veteran receiver Cooper Kupp, the No. 1 seed means a chance to play playoff games in his home state, and after years of playing regular-season games at Lumen Field as a member of the Rams, he's excited to see what Seahawks fans can bring to a playoff atmosphere.

"It's huge. I can't tell you how pumped I am to see the atmosphere and see what the 12s bring," Kupp said. "My expectations are very high for what they're going to bring, I'm putting that out there now. I'm so excited to be able to be a part of it.

"It's pretty exciting. Obviously, this feels great, but we also know there's a lot more ahead. Our goals are very high, and this is just a step along the way."

That was also the message Macdonald gave his team to close out his locker room speech. The Seahawks have every right to enjoy what they accomplished with an impressive win over the 49ers, but there are much bigger goals at stake now.

"We have work to do, OK?" Macdonald said. "We are not done. Men, we have gotten here through our mentality of every freakin' day. You have done it over and over and over again. So that's what it's going to take next week. They'll be time to talk about it; right now, it's time to freakin' celebrate."