Kyle Shanahan has finally gotten over the hump … sort of.
Shanahan’s San Francisco 49ers pulled off a clutch come-from-behind victory over the Green Bay Packers in Saturday’s divisional playoff game. Despite trailing 21-14 to start the fourth quarter, the 49ers scored twice (a field goal and a touchdown) before intercepting Packers rookie QB Jordan Love on Green Bay’s final drive to seal the 24-21 win.
INT NO. 2 FROM DRE GREENLAW!
📺: #GBvsSF on FOX
📱: Stream on #NFLPlus https://t.co/yDUx5ZutVa pic.twitter.com/m2bUwvM8TK— NFL (@NFL) January 21, 2024
The comeback victory by San Francisco snapped a hideous streak involving Shanahan.
Prior to Saturday’s game, the 49ers were 0-30 under Shanahan when trailing by five points or more entering the fourth quarter (per ESPN’s Adam Schefter). But with the comeback over the Packers, the 49ers finally got their first such win in seven seasons of Shanahan being in charge.
Shanahan did well to manage Saturday’s contest. He overcame the loss of Deebo Samuel to a shoulder injury in the first half and made a smart decision not to call timeout before Christian McCaffrey’s go-ahead TD in the fourth quarter (which bled 40 key seconds that the Packers could have used). While there is still a lot more work for him to do to change the narrative, especially with Shanahan’s lengthy history of blowing playoff games, this divisional round victory was a big step in the right direction.
