Seahawks Notebook | Holmgren admits he lost wits

KIRKLAND — On an emotionally-charged day at Seahawks headquarters that ended with fullback Mack Strong's public decision to end his football career, coach Mike Holmgren admitted that his own emotions got in the way late in the first half of the Seahawks' loss at Pittsburgh.

To the point he lost his composure.

The Seahawks trailed 7-0 and were in their two-minute offense with 1:52 to play before halftime. Two short passes to Shaun Alexander. A 30-yard strike to Ben Obomanu. Then quarterback Matt Hasselbeck was sacked on first down.

Tick, tick, tick went the seconds off the clock. The Seahawks had all three timeouts available but none was called. Holmgren said the game clock went from 40 seconds to 23 on the sack.

"I could have saved 12 seconds, probably, somewhere in there," Holmgren said. "He got sacked. Look, I would like to tell you, I got really mad, like I got seeing-red mad. And so I just kind of flamed out for a second there. I came back."

The Seahawks got as far as the Steelers' 14-yard line before Hasselbeck was intercepted on a throw he made with 7 seconds left.

Holmgren was concerned that the Steelers might have time to get the ball down the field with their three timeouts remaining if the Seahawks couldn't sustain the drive. So he thought about running out the clock after the sack near midfield. But the Seahawks got to striking distance and never did stop the clock.

"Two things were in my mind even when I was ticked off," Holmgren said. "They had three timeouts left. After a sack I'm kind of reluctant to call a timeout in that situation anyway ... but I messed up right there. Even if I'd stayed calm and cool I might have just said, 'OK, enough's enough, let's go in and regroup.' But it wasn't my finest moment."

Holmgren was asked to give a film review of the Pittsburgh game after evaluating footage.

"Straight to video," Holmgren said.

More for Morris

Holmgren said backup running back Maurice Morris will get more carries, but not out of concern for Alexander's cracked wrist.

Morris was coming off a hip injury suffered in the season opener and missed the next two games. He has just eight carries for 28 yards this season and didn't get to run the ball Sunday.

"Sitting Shaun for his hand, that's not going to speed up anything," Holmgren said, referring to the wrist's healing process. "So I wouldn't do that. But Mo practices hard ... I was planning to get him some carries in the game but we had the ball so few times in the second half, it was kind of funny how it worked out."

Holmgren's response came after he was asked if he has considered resting Alexander. The former MVP has 378 yards in five games and is averaging 3.7 yards per carry. Morris typically gets more playing time than he has so far this season.

"I'm not doing anything different, I'm just doing it the way that we used to do it before Mo got hurt," Holmgren said.

Notes

• Holmgren said CB Josh Wilson, who missed Sunday's game with an ankle injury, might come back this week.

• Seahawks CB Marcus Trufant is one of 17 NFL players selected by The Home Depot's NFL Neighborhood MVP Program for his work in the community, and today he'll join volunteers in helping construct a playground at West Seattle Elementary School.

José Miguel Romero: 206-464-2409 or jromero@seattletimes.com