The Seattle Seahawks' players were widely expecting Marshawn Lynch to get the ball on 2nd down on the one-yard line in the final seconds of the Super Bowl.

"We had it," said Bruce Irvin. "I don't understand how you don't give it to the best back in the league on the 1-yard line."

An anonymous Seahawk spoke to NFL.com's Mike Silver after the game and blamed Pete Carroll's play call on the coach's wish to elevate Russell Wilson over Marshawn Lynch:

I'll spare you the numerous "What the (expletive) was he thinking?" mutterings I overheard from people in Seahawks uniforms and refrain from lending any legitimacy to the conspiracy theory which one anonymous player was willing to broach: That Carroll somehow had a vested interest in making Wilson, rather than Lynch, the hero, and thus insisted on putting the ball in the quarterback's hands with an entire season on the line. "That's what it looked like," the unnamed player said, but I'd be willing to bet that he merely muttered it out of frustration, and that it was a fleeting thought.