Cardinals back into playoffs with disappointing loss to Seahawks

The Arizona Cardinals didn’t take advantage of an opportunity to win the NFC West on Sunday as they ended the 2021 season with a loss to the Seattle Seahawks.

Heading into their 2021 season finale on Sunday, the Arizona Cardinals could have won their first NFC West title since 2015 with a victory over the Seattle Seahawks plus a Los Angeles Rams loss to the San Francisco 49ers.

Well, the Rams ended up losing to the 49ers in overtime, so that part was taken care of. However, the Cardinals were unable to take advantage of their opportunity as they lost to an unimpressive Seahawks team by a final score of 38 to 30 on Sunday.

With the loss, Arizona‘s record dropped to 11-5, and they did not finish on top of the NFC West. Since starting the season with seven wins in a row, the Cardinals suffered losses in six of their final 10 games, including four of their last five.

After loss to Seattle Seahawks, who will Arizona Cardinals face in the 2021 playoffs?

With their loss to Seattle on Sunday and San Francisco being able to defeat Los Angeles, Arizona will enter the 2021 playoffs as the No. 5 seed in the NFC.

Next week, the Cardinals’ first postseason matchup since the 2015 campaign will be on the road against a familiar foe in the Rams.

Arizona lost their most recent meeting with Los Angeles back in Week 14 by a final score of 30 to 23. However, the Cardinals got a big 17-point victory over the Rams earlier this season in Week 4 when the game took place in Los Angeles.

Both teams look much different than that Week 4 matchup, so the results probably won’t be similar. However, Arizona should be happy about playing this game outside of their home stadium as they were 8-1 on the road this season.