SANTA CLARA, Calif.—An NFL team's fate can't really be determined 10 games into a 17 games season. Too much can happen over the final two months of the season for anything to truly be a make-or-break situation in mid-November.

And yet, when the Seahawks offense took the field trailing by four points with 2:38 left on the clock, it sure felt like, in some ways, the season was on the line. If the Seahawks could march 80 yards for a game-winning score, they and the 49ers would both be 5-5, within striking distance of the Cardinals, who are 6-4 and on their bye week. A loss, however, would have been the Seahawks' sixth in seven games, dropping their record to 4-6, and left them looking up at the standings at the entire NFC West, with the Rams also winning Sunday to improve to 5-5.

Add to all of that the fact that the Seahawks had lost six in a row, postseason included, to the 49ers since their last win in 2021, and it sure felt like a heck of a lot was riding on that final drive. And with so much on the line, quarterback Geno Smith, as he has done in so many late-game situations in his three seasons as Seattle's starter, delivered when his team needed it most.

With the Seahawks needing a touchdown for the win, Smith completed 7 of 8 pass attempts for 54 yards on an 11-play, 80-yard drive that he capped with a 13-yard touchdown run, his second long scramble of the drive, having also picked up 16 yards immediately after a sack made it second-and-13.

"That was a great football game," Seahawks coach Mike Macdonald said. "It's a big-time win for us as a team. We all knew that was a big game, for obvious reasons."

On Thursday, Seahawks offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb was asked to name his quarterback's best trait, and he quickly pointed to Smith's resilience, which shows up both in games, and also in the path of his entire career, which saw spend seven seasons as a backup before getting a chance once again to be a starter.

Three days later, Smith backed up his offensive coordinator's assessment, rebounding from an interception on Seattle's first possession of the second half to lead a 70-yard touchdown drive on Seattle's next possession. Then, late in the fourth quarter, a Seahawks defense that played great all afternoon came up with one more big stop, forcing the 49ers to punt, giving Smith and the offense one more possession to win the game.

"He was dynamite," Macdonald said of Smith. "We talked about, after the pick, just sticking with it, we talk about clearing the next room, just go clear the next room and rock and roll. After he threw the pick, we got the stop on defense, forced a field goal, and we went right back down and scored the touchdown."

Smith, who noted earlier in the week that the Seahawks needed to be able to beat the 49ers in order to be the team they think they can be, backed that up by beating the 49ers for the first time in his three years as Seattle's starter. Smith knows there's a lot of season left to be played, but Sunday's win at Levi's stadium was a big step for the Seahawks.

"Division games are always going to feel like this," Smith said. "These are the most important games of your season. The way that we came out and fought, collectively as a unit, as a team, it just spoke to our urgency. The way we practiced all week, I knew we were going to come out and play well.

"We won the game. We know how much was at stake, we're trying to turn our season around. We had a bye week, and we've got eight games ahead of us to put ourselves in the position that we want to be in. This is just a step in the right direction for us, so I was very ecstatic and happy for that."

Smith punctuated his game-winning score by heaving the ball into the crowd with a yell, then later he broke out the "Night-night" celebration used by Golden State Warriors guard Steph Curry after hitting a big shot to put a game on ice.

"In the Bay, got to do it," Smith said of the Curry homage.

As for his ability to come through late in the game yet again—this was Smith's 10^th game-winning drive in the fourth quarter or overtime over the past three seasons—Smith said the perspective gained over the course of his career helps him stay calm with the game on the line.

"I just think perspective," he said. "I was out there smiling on that last drive. I walked on the field, it kind of felt like 'Angels in the Outfield,' like somebody was just rubbing my shoulders the whole time. I just felt like there was no pressure. I think the perspective that I have, that I've gained over my career has allowed me to play that way. Whenever there is a mistake that's made, I never really get too down on myself, and also don't' get to high when good things happen. As long as you stay even-keeled throughout the process, I think things work out better that way."

Smith bouncing back from an earlier interception to lead a game-winning drive hardly came as a surprise to his teammates, whether they have played with him for multiple seasons or for just a few weeks.

"His command, young kinds now say aura," said linebacker Ernest Jones IV, who has also played against Smith several times as member of the Rams. "The way he comes into a huddle, you sense with Geno, at any point he's going to make a play, he's going to be where he needs to be for his teammates, and he showed up for us tonight in a big way."

Said Jaxon Smith-Njigba, who had a team-high 110 yards on 10 catches, four of which came on the winning drive, "Geno never gives up. When we take the field, we feel like we should score. That's our attitude, that's our confidence going into the game, and we're rocking with him."

"He takes it play by play. One, you can't get to a big play or a shot play without the first play. So just taking it step by step is something that he preaches and something that our offense believes in and has shown time after time. It's something that I feel like is built in our offense, when it's time to score, we need one. We're just going to take it one play at a time and that's what we stand on."

And with Smith leading the way in the final minutes, the Seahawks made those plays, one at a time, to pull off their biggest win of the season, one that has them right in the thick of the NFC West race.

"It means a lot," Smith-Njigba said of the win. "This is a win we kind of took personal, not winning in six games. At the beginning of the week, I said I felt like it's a playoff game, so we've got to go out here and win, and I felt like our team felt that. We were all on the same page, and it's a big win for us, for sure. But we've got Arizona next week, and we've got to be ready for that."

Added Devon Witherspoon, "It was long overdue. They beat us many times before this without us getting a W, and today we came out and we got a W. So it was long overdue."