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How Rams built a streak and then gutted out a gross, cathartic win: ‘It’s December football’

By Jourdan Rodrigue

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5991615/2024/12/13/rams-beat-49ers-sweep-matthew-stafford-sean-mcvay/?source=emp_shared_article

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Would you believe it? In two wins over the last five days, the Los Angeles Rams have scored 56 points!*

* Forty-four in Sunday’s win at home over the Buffalo Bills and the other anemic, soggy 12 points — no touchdowns — came in a Thursday night win at San Francisco.

They’ll take it. This was the 49ers, after all, who had Rams head coach Sean McVay in knots for a few consecutive years not so very long ago. This wasn’t pretty, but it was a sweep. The Rams are 8-6 after beginning the season 1-4, and have won seven of their last nine games after their Week 6 bye. Everything is ahead of them, if they can seize it.

That was McVay’s message to his team after a Week 12 whupping at the hands of the Philadelphia Eagles. The team had six games and 39 days still guaranteed to them, McVay told them.

What would they do with it?

“You spend all this time this year, your entire life for a lot of these guys (myself included) just working for moments like this,” said quarterback Matthew Stafford, still in his pads at the lectern postgame. “Sometimes you kick off Sept. 1 and you go, ‘Man, there’s a lot of football to be played,’ (and) it’s daunting to look at the whole chunk.

“He broke it down for us, did a hell of a job going, ‘Hey there are this many days left.’ … That was one that definitely resonated with the group. … Guys are rallying behind it and continuing to do whatever we can to win games.”

Now, they have won three in a row — two games with a combined three first-half points that bookend a 44-point performance — and they don’t seem to care much about how they get it done, or in what atmosphere.

“I (think) it serves us well that there are different ways that we can win a football game,” said McVay, his sweatshirt still drenched after the 12-6 victory when he spoke at the lectern. “Now, we’d like to be able to put it all together. But to be able to do that, that’s a real strength. It’s something we’re gonna take as a positive.”

“They both count for one (win),” Stafford added.

Rain fell throughout much of the first half — not the fat, wet droplets that roll off of facemasks but the seeping, permeating kind that settles under pads and slicks down every surface. Neither team did much in the first half. The Rams amassed just 89 yards of offense by halftime and punted five times despite running 30 plays; the 49ers had 108 yards of offense and punted six times while running 31 plays. Neither team finished the game with a touchdown.

“As a team, we had to lean on each other. We had to really work through whatever the elements (were),” said Kyren Williams, whose gloves got so soggy at one point that he took them off to play without them for the first time in his life.

Stafford’s night was light-years away from his nearly-perfect game against Buffalo. He was almost intercepted on four separate plays. But Stafford ultimately didn’t cost the Rams any big swings — and now has a five-game streak without throwing an interception for the first time in his 16-year career.

“Sure, I would love to have not hit (Talanoa) Hufanga in the chest on third down,” Stafford said drily. “And score a bunch of points. But you gotta play each play as it is, each game as it is. We got a win.”

Stafford hung tough, which perhaps was most important on a disgusting night like Thursday. Who can dip further into the darkness, and like it? Stafford lowered his shoulder on a third-and-long run to convert the down, and McVay (perhaps unwisely, though he didn’t admit as much postgame) even called a zone read keeper for Stafford in the red zone that was called back because of a holding penalty. Stafford got crushed on the tackle and came up holding his abdomen and wincing.

“(How my body feels), we’ll figure that out later, I’m not worried about it. I got 10 days,” Stafford said. “I mean, it’s December. Our season is on the line every single week we go out there. It was gonna be tough to throw the football in the long run. … At that point, it was time to go. Wasn’t exactly sure where I was (on the conversion), but wasn’t gonna be sliding a half-yard short. …Needed that.

“I loved the (zone read) call. I thought Fred (Warner) did a good job reading out of the stack. … At any point, we get down that close, man, and I’m doing anything I can to try and score. If it’s me surprising everybody in the stadium that I’m still holding on to it, trying to get in, I’m all for it.”

The Rams got their screen game going in the third quarter and in doing so, showed some life. They extended their wider zone run game with the quick, short passing plays that moved the ball toward the edges of the defense and asked linemen and receivers to haul downfield to block. Running back Blake Corum made the longest offensive gain of the game to that point midway through the third quarter on a 12-yard screen. Inward-moving screens exploited the seams and got larger interior linemen like right guard Kevin Dotson barreling downfield to block with a full head of bad-intentioned steam, such as a big gain by Puka Nacua during which Dotson looked like a war rig in the post-apocalyptic world of “Mad Max” ping-ponging players out of Nacua’s path. Those plays helped mitigate the issues and risks popping up from the weather, and when the rain did finally stop the Rams re-took to the air.

Still, they couldn’t score a touchdown. Stafford hit Nacua for a 51-yard catch that moved the Rams to the 16-yard line in the fourth quarter. The offense got all the way to the 8-yard line but couldn’t gain two yards on second and third down, and rookie Josh Karty kicked again.

Karty, who went to college at Stanford just about a half-hour’s drive from Levi’s Stadium and who had family and friends in the stands Thursday night, hit all four of his field goals to account for the Rams’ 12 points. He also notched a 48-yarder in the rain in the first half. Karty struggled with consistency earlier in the year, but McVay had a one-on-one conversation with him mid-slump to tell him he had his back.

“He’s kind of unflappable,” McVay said. “He went out there and even the long one, the 48-yarder, I mean he knocked that thing true and it was firm and had great trajectory on it. The next three were excellent. … He did a great job. I was really proud of him, but I don’t know that I was too surprised.”

After a game in which the Rams defense allowed 42 points to Buffalo, and entered Thursday night with the third-worst EPA/play against deep throws in the NFL — plus were short-handed at cornerback as starter Cobie Durant recovers from a lung contusion — they held San Francisco’s offense to just 191 net yards.

Further, the veteran cornerback tandem of Darious Williams and Ahkello Witherspoon iced out a late comeback attempt by 49ers quarterback Brock Purdy and his receivers. Witherspoon broke up a deep pass intended for rookie Ricky Pearsall, and just a few plays later Williams intercepted Purdy on a touchdown attempt targeting Jauan Jennings.

Williams said the two fed off each others’ energy all game. They knew the San Francisco game plan would try to attack them, especially in a season in which Purdy’s air yards are up, and his receivers’ typical voluminous yards after the catch are down.

“We (knew it would) kind of come down to us, right? San Fran, they like to kind of just set us up, hit a couple big plays across the middle,” Williams said, “and our game plan today was just to get hands-on, be as aggressive as we can.

“Seeing (Witherspoon) over there making plays, I’m like, ‘I’ve got to hold my side down.’ ”

Defensive tackle and captain Kobie Turner set the tone for the front seven with four pressures and two sacks — all of which came against double teams, according to Next Gen Stats. No player has recorded more pressures (42) against double teams since the start of last season. Inside linebacker Christian Rozeboom recorded the third and final sack of the game with 6 seconds left, a bit of a daring call by coordinator Chris Shula who sent extra pressure on Purdy’s Hail Mary attempt instead of dropping every non-lineman back into coverage.

Perhaps no greater swing of momentum came — in a game with little from which to choose — when 49ers receiver Deebo Samuel dropped a sure first-down, possible touchdown pass from Purdy on third-and-10 at the Los Angeles 29-yard line in the third quarter. It started out as the quintessential “Deebo against the Rams” play — you know the one. But it bounced off and then away from him and San Francisco was held to a field goal.

That play felt like the end of something for San Francisco, and certainly it was a satisfied smirk for the Rams. They swept the 49ers for the first time since 2018.

“It means everything. Literally on the way here, our pilot said, ‘Go sweep the Niners.’ When he said that, I was like, ‘Dang, we really could. … I don’t think I’ve done that since I’ve been here,’ ” Williams said.

“It’s huge. It shows that we’re the big brothers now.”