NEWS NOW: Packers’ defence and 49ers’ running attack were crucial to their …

NEWS NOW: Packers’ defence and 49ers’ running attack were crucial to their …..

The post 49ers’ rushing attack and defence were crucial to their win over the Packers first aired on NBC Sports Bay Area.

SANTA CLARA On Saturday at Levi’s Stadium, the two teams who historically have best represented this style of play—old-school, hard-nosed football games—will square off in the NFC divisional playoff round.

The 49ers, the NFC’s top playoff seed after a first-round bye, will host the seventh-seeded Green Bay Packers in a game that should favour San Francisco substantially. But given Green Bay’s incredible 48-32 wild-card annihilation of the Dallas Cowboys last weekend, it’s probably better to wad up that piece of paper and toss it in the garbage.

Starting and stopping the run game will be the main priorities for San Francisco on both sides of the ball. Defence coordinator Steve Wilks’ main priority this week is game preparing for the dynamic Green Bay offence, which is built upon running back Aaron Jones’ bludgeoning rushing assault.

Following practice on Wednesday, Wilks said, “The most important thing is, we have to try and stop this run, to try and make them one-dimensional.” “When they’re very effective running the ball, I think it just opens up the play-action and that’s when you see [Packers QB Jordan Love] being really effective in taking his shots down the field and finding an open receiver.”

Last Saturday, Jones had an incredible performance against the Cowboys, accumulating 118 running yards (5.6 average) on 21 runs and three touchdowns on the ground.

After missing San Francisco’s last five regular-season games due to foot and knee problems, lineman Arik Armstead will make his comeback to the field on Saturday, which will be a huge boost to the 49ers defensive line. The nine-year veteran is familiar with the task that 29-year-old running back Jones poses since they have faced each other several times over the years, including a couple times in the playoffs.

Armstead said on Wednesday, “I’ve played against a lot of great running backs, including Aaron Jones.” “His ability to slash makes him a very special running back; he can locate a hole, crease, and slash his way to gain yards. Although he is not very large, he runs well, so we will face a great challenge from him.”

With All-Pro running back Christian McCaffrey leading the 49ers’ rushing assault against the porous Green Bay rushing defence, this game may have the greatest mismatch.

This season, the Packers have allowed opposing offences the fifth-highest amount of rushing yards (2,181) and the eighth-highest number of rushing first downs (120), with four games in which the opposition has gained 200 yards or more on the ground.

Chris Foerster, the offensive line and run game coordinator for San Francisco, doesn’t place much value on those striking stats.

According to Foerster, “every team can have a bad day on offence or defence.” “I believe that it takes a few big runs for that to happen; you can pop one or two big runs.” That is ultimately what transpires. We did not have a rush of more than seven yards in our first-round playoff run against the Vikings a few years back, despite running for a lot of yards. Getting a large number was difficult.

“Whenever you have a big day running the football, there’s going to be some explosive runs in there somewhere.”

Thankfully, the 49ers have the NFL’s 2023 rushing champion in McCaffrey, who ranked first in rushing first downs (83), second in 10-plus yard runs (272), and third in the league behind Tennessee Titans back Derrick Henry (280).

Raheem Mostert, who finished the NFC Championship Game four years ago with 29 touches for an amazing 220 rushing yards and four touchdowns, was the last 49ers running back to play the Packers at Levi’s Stadium in the playoffs.

Even though McCaffrey could have a great game on Saturday, it will be difficult to surpass Mostert’s historic display against a Packers defence that has seen several changes over the years.

“It was a great one, Raheem,” McCaffrey said. “I definitely had seen that one, but that was five years ago, so a lot of things change in [four] years.”

If the 49ers can carry out their game plan on both sides of the ball, they will punch their ticket to their third straight NFC Championship Game.