On this day 248 years ago, our great nation was conceived in liberty and declared independence from Great Britain. A scrappy group of patriotic underdogs fought back against one of the world’s dominant powers at the time and won freedom.

In 2024, the Seattle Seahawks will look to do the same against their greatest foe – the San Francisco 49ers.

Overall, historically speaking, the Seahawks outright own the 49ers. The all time series record is 30-22 in favor of Seattle. The Seahawks also own the longest win streak in the rivalry, having won 10-straight starting in the 2013 postseason until December of 2018. But the gap has begun to close in recent years.

Currently, the 49ers have won the last five meetings between the two teams – the longest San Francisco win streak in the series – and they have hardly been competitive. Starting in September of 2022, they have gone as follows:

• 27-7 San Francisco

• 21-13 San Francisco (Thursday Night Football in Seattle)

• 41-23 San Francisco (Wild Card)

• 30-13 San Francisco (Thanksgiving game in Seattle)

• 28-16 San Francisco

The only one of these games that ended in one score was the 21-13 TNF game, and the Seahawks were trailing 21-6 going into the fourth quarter. Not only are the 49ers dominating the Seahawks, they’re also doing so at Lumen Field in prime time… a setting Seattle historically does exceptionally well in.

There is hope. The Seahawks hired former Baltimore Ravens defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald to be their new head coach. I have to imagine part of what got him the job was how well Baltimore handled the 49ers on Christmas Day last year. The Ravens completely shut down Kyle Shanahan’s offense, holding them to 19 points while snagging five interceptions from quarterbacks Brock Purdy and Sam Darnold.

Having Macdonald in charge won’t automatically make the Seahawks defense as good as the Ravens were. But it certainly gives more optimism that he can crack the code at slowing down one of the most dominant teams in the league.

There is still a sizeable gap between San Francisco and Seattle, unfortunately. But here’s hoping the Seahawks can close the gap and start to right the wrongs of this current losing streak.

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Story originally appeared on Seahawks Wire