SEATTLE — Maybe next year.
Maybe the opportunity to host the Super Bowl is now the necessary element for the Rams to play in it.
On Sunday, their season came to an end with a 31-27 defeat by the Seattle Seahawks in the NFC championship game before 68,773 at Lumen Field.
Matthew Stafford passed for three touchdowns, but for the first time in these playoffs the 17th-year pro could not engineer a comeback victory.
The Seahawks will play the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX on Feb. 8 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara.
It’s a rematch of Super Bowl XLIX at the end of the 2014 season, when the Patriots prevented the Seahawks from winning back to back titles.
The Rams, meantime, are left to ponder what might have been.
Coach Sean McVay lost an NFC championship game for the first time, failing to repeat what they did to beat the New Orleans Saints in the 2018 season and the San Francisco 49ers in 2021.
The Rams were attempting to win their third playoff game on the road.
They defeated the Carolina Panthers, 34-31, in the wild-card round in Charlotte, N.C., and then survived freezing conditions and the Chicago Bears in a 20-17 overtime victory at Soldier Field.
But Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold would not let that happen. The former USC star passed for 346 yards and three touchdowns. And the “Dark Side” defense came up big when it needed to.
Stafford completed 22 of 35 passes for 374 yards. Puka Nacua caught nine passes for 165 yards and a touchdown, and Davante Adams caught four passes for 89 yards and a touchdown.
But it was not enough.
The Rams trailed, 17-13, at halftime after Darnold connected with Jaxon Smith-Njigba for a 14-yard touchdown with 20 seconds left in the second quarter.
The Rams forced the Seahawks to punt on the first possession, but Rams kick returner Xavier Smith fell down while attempting to catch the punt, and the Seahawks recovered the ball. Darnold then found Jake Bobo for a 17-yard touchdown.
Stafford, however, immediately answered with a 40-yard pass to tight end Colby Parkinson and a 29-yard strike to Adams before finishing the drive with a two-yard touchdown pass to Adams.
But the Seahawks came right back, Darnold finding former Rams star Cooper Kupp for a 13-yard touchdown and 31-20 lead.
The Rams then got a huge break. A drive that seemingly ended with an incomplete pass on third down was kept alive when Seahawks cornerback Riq Woolen was penalized for taunting. On the next play, Stafford found Nacua for a 34-yard touchdown pass that cut the lead to 31-27.
The Rams got the ball back early in the fourth quarter and drove to the Seahawks’ six-yard line. But a third-down pass to Konata Mumpfield and a fourth-down pass to Terrance Ferguson were both broken up by cornerback Devon Witherspoon.
The Rams got the ball at their seven-yard line with 25 seconds left, but they could not come back.
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