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Seahawks drub hapless Rams

Oct 22, 2007 - 2:29 AM SEATTLE (Ticker) -- The winless St. Louis Rams were the perfect tonic for the Seattle Seahawks.

Nate Burleson returned the second-half kickoff 91 yards for a touchdown and Josh Brown kicked four field goals as the Seahawks snapped a two-game losing streak with a 33-6 rout of the Rams on Sunday.

Burleson's return gave Seattle (4-3) a 17-3 lead, and that was more than enough against the Rams, who remain the NFC's only winless team.

"Special teams, I told them at halftime, I need a good return to start the second half," Seattle coach Mike Holmgren said. "That's good coaching right there."

The loss saddled St. Louis (0-7) with the worst start in franchise history. The Rams started 0-6 in 1962, when the team was located in Los Angeles.

Seattle harassed St. Louis quarterback Matt Bulger from start to finish, sacking him seven times and forcing him into five turnovers. Defensive end Darryl Tapp tied a Seahawks record with four sacks.

"My D-line coach and coach (John) Marshall were really on it this week to get pressure on the quarterback," Tapp said. "We didn't play our best last week, so we all took it as a challenge upon ourselves to get to the quarterback."

Playing with a rib injury that caused him to miss the last two games, Bulger completed 21-of-40 passes for 225 yards with three interceptions and two fumbles.

"We have a lot of pass rushers going to make some things happen and disrupt the quarterback," Seattle linebacker Julian Peterson said.

Matt Hasselbeck completed 18-of-35 passes for 195 yards and two touchdowns - both to Will Heller - for Seattle, which moved back into sole possession of first place in the NFC West Division.

The Seahawks were never threatened, as Hasselbeck capped Seattle's first possession with a 1-yard touchdown pass to Heller with 7:40 left in the first quarter.

"Our tempo has not been very good this year, but on that (first drive) I felt we did a nice job of getting to the line of scrimmage and calling a play and running it," Hasselbeck said. "It was a good drive a great start."

The only negative for Seattle was an inability to generate a strong rushing attack. Shaun Alexander was held to 47 yards on 19 carries.

Alexander has been held under 50 yards in his last three games, and his struggles have the Seahawks concerned.

"We are working real hard to fix some of the things that aren't going right," Holmgren said. "Clearly, our best football is ahead of us."

But the lack of a running game hardly mattered against the punchless Rams, whose offense consisted of a pair of field goals by Jeff Wilkins.

"It's obvious when you turn the ball over the way we have turned the ball over the first seven games, you can't win and we've proven that," Rams coach Scott Linehan said. "Until we fix that, we'll continue to get the same result."

It marked the fourth time this season the Rams failed to score in double figures and the third time they did not reach the end zone.

The Rams' play has left tight end Randy McMichael disgusted.

"Right now, I am embarrassed to be one (a Ram)," McMichael said. "It makes no sense what we did offensively today."

The Rams, who suffered a 22-3 loss to the Baltimore Ravens last week, have not scored a touchdown in eight quarters.

"We stunk up the football field the whole game," McMichael added. "We didn't get nothing, we didn't get no rhythm. We didn't protect our quarterback. We let our coach down. We wanted to get this one for him. He deserved it."

Bulger got into a heated exchange with Linehan on the sideline but tried to downplay the confrontation.

"I think every player and coach are going to get into it probably 10 times during a game," Bulger said. "I honestly don't know what it was, but I'm sure it was on TV. Five seconds later, it's just football. That's the kind of thing that happens when you're 0-7."

After Wilkins' 29-yard field sliced Seattle's lead to 17-6 with 10:33 left in the third quarter, Brown kicked field goals on three of the Seahawks' next possession.

Following Bulger's third interception, Hasselbeck completed the scoring by tossing an 11-yard TD strike to Heller with 6:08 remaining in the contest.