Cardinals rookie LB Golden looking iffy for matchup versus Seahawks

With the concerns about depth in the secondary after safety Tyrann Mathieu’s ACL tear answered in a dominating game last week, it’s hard to imagine Seattle’s offense seeing much daylight. In the Seahawks’ case, they can move from the No. 6 to the No. 5 seed with a victory and a Green Bay home win over Minnesota – but that game won’t take place until Sunday night, so the Seahawks may not know where they’re headed in the Wild Card round until hours after their matchup in Arizona ends.

With a win, it would tie the franchise record’s longest winning streak – 10 games. The Redskins are hotter than whichever team gets the No. 3 seed, Minnesota or Green Bay. Gurley was held to 41 yards on just nine carries and the Rams had just 66 rushing yards as a team.

According to the model, the Cardinals have a 24% chance to win the Super Bowl, just ahead of the Patriots at 21%.

It will be an interesting game Sunday in Glendale, Ariz. After a back-and-forth 10-10 first half, though, Arizona delivered a 42-yard catch-and-run by Michael Floyd midway through the 3rd quarter, forced a 3-and-out, and ate up over 7 minutes driving for a field goal. Rawls, an undrafted rookie from Central Michigan, had picked up some of the slack with 830 yards and four scores, before breaking his ankle in a 35-6 win over the Ravens.

While many believe Bruce Arians would be best served sitting key starters against the Seahawks, the Cardinals coach has been consistent in that everyone will play.

The Seahawks were dealt an terrible blow when Marshawn Lynch for most of the season, but he will return to practice Monday and Seattle will try to work him into the rotation to reach full health for the playoffs. They are number one in points and yards. On first down, Palmer tried to hit running back David Johnson on a screen pass, but it was intercepted by lineman Mike Daniels, who returned it to the Cardinals’ 15-yard line.

It was a turning point for the Seahawks as well.

The Seattle-Arizona game will be streaming in regions across the country. The Cardinals played two of these games as the St. Louis Cardinals. Bettcher often sends one or more players on a blitz of the quarterback, relying on his talented defense to match up with receivers man-on-man. Chris Johnson is the Cardinals’ leading rusher this season, as he has totaled 814 rushing yards, three rushing touchdowns, and a 4.2 yards per carry average. The Cardinals had a heavy rush to Wilson’s left side, but did not contain the other side of the line, allowing the mobile quarterback to scamper downfield to get the Seahawks into field-goal range.

This is going to be a weird game. He’s playing tight end, fullback and defensive tackle.

The Cardinals have the No. 1 offense and No. 5 defense in the league, and few expected the team to be quite this good. The Packers lost to the Seahawks, 28-22, in overtime in Seattle during the Conference Championship last season, and fell to the 49ers, 45-31, in San Francisco during the Divisional Round three years ago.