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No style points are awarded in the National Football League, so even for the defending Super Bowl champions, all that matters about the outcome of each game is that it ends up as a win.

That’s what Earl Thomas and the Seattle Seahawks got on Monday night.

The Seahawks endured 13 penalties and nearly gave up a 17-0 lead before escaping with a 27-17 road victory over the Washington Redskins at FedEx Field in Landover, Md. With the win, Seattle improved to 3-1 and is now tied for first in the NFC West.

The season-high penalty total set the Seahawks back on a number of occasions, including the nullification of a Percy Harvin touchdown in three separate instances. But the Seattle defense proved solid once again, particularly against the run where they held Washington to just 32 yards on the ground.

Earl contributed with three tackles, one key pass deflection and nearly grabbed his first interception of the season on a few occasions. Afterward, he noted the importance of the win and the strangeness of the game as a whole

“It’s never perfect. That’s what so challenging about football,” ET III said. “The game was lopsided in a lot of different ways…We didn’t (create) any turnovers, but we still won the game, so when you look at all of that it kind of doesn’t make sense. It’s a weird way of winning, but we found a way.”

Early on in the primetime matchup on ESPN—Seattle’s only scheduled Monday night appearance of the season—it looked like the champs would dominate on the road.

ET gave the Legion of Boom a rousing pre-game speech as the team looked for its first road victory of the season.

The LOB started the game on the sideline, as quarterback Russell Wilson went to work early.

Over the course of the evening, the third-year star rushed for 122 yards, a career-high and the most yards by a quarterback in Monday Night Football history.

His historic night started on the game’s opening drive. Faced with a third-and-5 on Seattle’s first series, Wilson kept the drive alive by scrambling for 16 yards up the middle. Wilson then rushed for 29 more yards to the Washington 15-yard line before throwing a touchdown pass to Jermaine Kearse on the game’s next play to put Seattle up 7-0.

On Washington’s ensuing drive, Earl and the Legion of Boom held strong, and refused to allow Kirk Cousins and the offense into Seattle’s half of the field.

ET III made his presence known on a 2nd-and-5 from the Washington 37-yard line.

No. 29 blitzed hard from the edge but saw D.C. receiver DeSean Jackson slip out into the flat and make himself available for a catch that surely would’ve allowed him to pick up enough yardage for the first-down and then some.

But Earl wasn’t about to allow that to happen.

Once he had diagnosed the play, ET III altered his path and showed incredible recovery speed as he turned back upfield and caught up to Jackson just as the pass was delivered, allowing Earl to knock the ball to the ground.

After a failed third down play, Washington was forced to punt and Seattle’s next possession saw Wilson continue his ground assault. The Seahawks quarterback rushed for 35 yards on the drive and had Seattle in position to grab a quick two-score lead, but a fumbled snap on 3rd-and-5 forced a Jon Ryan punt from midfield.

The Hawks defense continued to stand tall on the next Washington possession, forcing the home team into a quick three-and-out.

Earl nearly ended the drive early when, on 2nd-and-10, a pass slipped through the hands of Jackson and into the arms of a diving ET III. But No. 29 couldn’t come up with the pick and the ball fell to the ground. The drive still quickly fizzled out and a punt gave Wilson and the Seahawks excellent field position at their own 43-yard line.

However, penalties began to set Seattle back during the drive, particularly after a false start turned a manageable third-and-4   into a third-and-9. Wilson was sacked on the third-down play, leading to another punt from Ryan.

But despite their struggles with flags, the Hawks were dominating the game at the close of the first quarter, particularly on defense as Washington had amassed just 16 total yards.

That Seahawks dominance continued on the first drive of the second frame, as Cousins and Co. went three-and-out again after gaining just four yards. The play of the Hawks defense once again gave the Seattle offense favorable field position.

But penalties again kept Seattle from making the most of the opportunity. Twice on the ensuing drive, Wilson and wide receiver Percy Harvin linked up for an apparent touchdown, and twice the play was called back due to a penalty. The setbacks forced Seattle into a field goal try and Steven Hauschka hit from 40 yards to put the visitors up 10-0.

After the game, ET talked at length about the penalties and joked about Harvin’s misfortune as it related to a fantasy football matchup between Earl and his brother.

“My little brother, I know he’s pissed off because we were going at it at in a fantasy league,” Earl said. “I had Russell Wilson, and he had Percy Harvin, and they called all the touchdowns back. So I know he’s pretty upset.”

After another fruitless Washington drive, Seattle’s offense finally took advantage of the stout first half play of the defense.

Wilson drove 70 yards in less than three minutes, and capped off the possession with a nine-yard touchdown run off a perfectly executed zone read. The touchdown gave the Hawks a commanding 17-0 lead and appeared that the route was on for Seattle.

But following the third Seahawks score, Washington answered back quickly and finally made their mark on the scoreboard late in the first half.

Their drive started at their own 20 and three hard runs by Morris pushed them to the 40. That’s where Cousins and Jackson used a nifty play to take the top off the Seahawks defense and end their shutout bid.

As the play broke out, Jackson ran an out and up route to the sideline. A miscommunication between Richard Sherman and Kam Chancellor allowed Jackson to get loose along the sideline and after evading the pass rush, Cousins hit Jackson in stride for a 60-yard touchdown.

Afterward, Earl tipped his cap to the speedy Jackson and said the Hawks would have to clean up that mistake going forward.

“We let two explosive plays get behinds us, and that let them stay in the game,” ET said. “But we’ll learn from it. We do a good job of correcting mistakes… If they were going to beat us deep, we knew it was going to be No. 11 (Jackson), and he did a great job.”

The Washington score was the last by either side in the first half and the teams went to the locker room with Seattle holding a 17-7 advantage.

Right after the break, Jackson and Cousins went back to work.

Down the opposite sideline, Jackson gained a step on corner Byron Maxwell and Earl bolted in to provide help defense, but the throw from Cousins was impeccable and landed in Jackson’s hands just out of the reach of ET and Maxwell.

“Just a phenomenal throw and catch by those guys,” Seattle head coach Pete Carroll said of the play. “That was just an awesome play. Our guys were all over it, but it was a better play by them.”

But No. 29 didn’t allow Washington to get all they could out of the play. ET III saved a touchdown as he pushed Jackson out of bounds after the receiver’s 57-yard reception.

Earl’s play proved to be crucial, as the Seattle defense recovered and forced Washington to settle for a field goal to bring the score to 17-10.

Neither team scored for the duration of the quarter, setting up an intense final 15 minutes.

In that final frame, and in almost comical fashion, a third apparent touchdown reception from Harvin — this time for 41 yards — on Seattle’s first drive of the quarter, was called back again due to an unnecessary roughness penalty.

Fortunately, the Seahawks were able to recover thanks to a fake field goal attempt that Ryan turned into a first down. Afterward Carroll praised the play of Ryan, not only on that play, but in his ability to flip the field all game and help the squad overcome the abundance of penalties.

“Jon had a fantastic game tonight punting the football, controlling the field and the whole thing,” Carroll said. “And he made that (4th down run) as well.”

After Ryan’s big play, the Hawks offense drove the remaining 32 yards to go ahead 24-10 on a nine-yard reception from Marshawn Lynch.

However, Seattle did not have the game in hand just yet and Washington quickly answered back with an 80-yard touchdown drive that made it a one-possession game with 3:35 remaining.

But the Seahawks offense closed it out, led by Wilson and Lynch. Lynch picked up a first down on the first play of the ensuing drive, but the Hawks still needed to get one more first down to really put the game on ice. The moment to truth came as Seattle faced third-and-4 from midfield with 2:33 remaining, and upon the snap Washington got heavy pressure on Wilson, flushing him out of the pocket.

But the shifty signal caller evaded the rush long enough to allow Lynch to get open and floated a pass to the Seattle runner who caught it and barreled 30 yards to the Washington 20 as the two-minute warning hit. Eventually, Hauschka hit a 43-yard field goal with less than a minute to go to put the game out of reach and secure the 27-17 road win.

In the locker room after the game, No. 29 lamented the opportunities to capitalize on turnovers that were lost, but maintained a positive outlook looking ahead.

“We had opportunities, including myself, but all you can do is just watch the film and see what happened and keep pressing towards the mark,” he said. “Keep progressing during this process and trying to get better each day.”

NEXT UP

Now, the Seahawks will turn their attention to Tony Romo and the red-hot Dallas Cowboys.

After losing their season opening contest to the San Francisco 49ers, Dallas has notched four-straight wins and boasts an NFL-best 4-1 record. Most recently, Dallas pulled out a clutch 20-17 victory over the Houston Texans in overtime on Sunday.

Seattle’s defense will have to deal with a dangerous two-fold Dallas offense. Running back DeMarco Murray leads the league in rushing attempts (130), rushing yards (670), rushing touchdowns (5), rushing yards per game (134) and all-purpose yards (794).

Meanwhile, Romo has thrown for nine touchdowns and is second in the league in completion percentage. Wide receivers Dez Bryant and Terrence Williams have proven to be reliable targets, garnering 376 and 250 yards, respectively.

Earl, an Orange, Texas native, last played his home-state team in Week 2 of 2012. He tallied three combined tackles and a pass deflection in a 27-7 Seahawks win.

The Hawks will host the Cowboys at 4:25 p.m. ET Sunday on Fox.

RELATED ARTICLES

• Seahawks at Redskins Recap (Seahawks.com, Oct. 6, 2014)
• Five takeaways from Seahawks’ 27-17 victory (HeraldNet, Oct. 6, 2014)
• Seahawks bottle up Alfred Morris (Seattle Times, Oct. 6, 2014)
• Seattle wins ugly on the road (FieldGulls, Oct. 6, 2014)
• Seahawks seeing red after penalty barrage (USA Today, Oct. 7, 2014)
• Photo Gallery: Seahawks beat Redskins 27-17 (Seattle Times, Oct. 6, 2014)