The San Francisco 49ers had three drives to retake the lead against the Seattle Seahawks in the NFC Championship game Sunday night. Colin Kaepernick had three chances to lead the 49ers to points that would send San Francisco to their second straight Super Bowl appearance.
Instead, each of those drives resulted in turnovers by Kaepernick that ended the 49ers’ chances of a comeback. But 49ers head coach Jim Harbaugh still praised the performance by Kaepernick in the game despite coming up short.
“I thought he played fabulous, I really did,” Harbaugh said, via Cam Inman of the San Jose Mercury News. “There’s things that happen both sides of the ball, special teams. You can point to a lot of areas I really feel the players just really acquitted themselves as well as they could on both sides of the ball, both teams.”
After the Seahawks scored to take a 20-17 lead, Kaepernick fumbled on a sack by Seattle defensive end Cliff Avril. Kaepernick was then intercepted twice, once by Kam Chancellor and again by Malcolm Smith off a deflected pass by Richard Sherman in the end zone.
Despite the turnovers, Kaepernick was one the biggest reasons San Francisco had the lead in the first place. He ran for 130 yards on 11 carries and threw a 26-yard touchdown pass to Anquan Boldin to give the 49ers a 17-10 lead. He finished the game 14 of 24 for 153 yards with a touchdown and two interceptions.
Kapernick put the blame on his shoulders for the loss but Harbaugh disagrees.
“No, that’s not accurate. Colin played his (butt) off. All players in the game did,” Harbaugh said.
Maybe it’s just playing the Seahawks that gives Kaepernick problems. Kaepernick has just two multi-interception games in his career since taking over the 49ers starter in 2012. Both of those games came in Seattle this season against the Seahawks. In four games overall against Seattle, he’s thrown seven interceptions.