With Saturday night’s victory over the Cardinals, the Rams are now on the verge of clinching the NFC West for the fourth time in Sean McVay’s eight years as head coach.
It’s not unrealistic that it’ll happen over the next two days, as Los Angeles will clinch strength of victory over Seattle if three of Minnesota, Buffalo, Washington, Cleveland, and San Francisco win or if two of those teams win and one ties. Entering the weekend, the Rams needed four wins or three wins and a tie, but the Bengals brought that number down with their overtime victory over the Broncos.
With that in mind, head coach Sean McVay first joked he’d have his head in the sand before admitting he’ll be scoreboard watching on Sunday.
“If there’s a chance we could win the division, I’m going to pay attention to that,” McVay said postgame. “We had to handle our business tonight for that to even be a possibility. So, it would mean a lot. But, again, what I don’t want to do is get ahead, because you get emotionally invested in other people’s games and that never has really served me very well. So, we’ll watch it. I’ll tell myself to not get invested, and then you will.
“But the reality is this: If you want to be able to do what we want to be able to do, you’ve got to handle your own business. And our guys did that tonight.”
Should Los Angeles clinch the division, it’s likely McVay would sit his starters in Week 18, as that’s what he’s done in the past once a playoff position is secure. But he didn’t address the specifics of that on Saturday night.
“I’ve got to look at a lot of different things, so we’ll see,” McVay said. “I don’t want to put the cart before the horse. Our focus and concentration will be on how do we get an opportunity to play a complete game against an excellent Seattle Seahawks football team. Until we have to decide otherwise, that’s were my focus and concentration will be.”
