SEATTLE — — The first two plays of Mike Macdonald’s head coaching career began with him watching his quarterback get sacked and throw an interception while being hit himself throwing.

“It started exactly how we wanted to start. We set it up that way. We just wanted a little adversity,” the new Seattle Seahawks coach said wryly.

Fortunately for Macdonald and the Seahawks, that ugly start and ugly first half led to a huge second half and a 26-20 victory over the Denver Broncos on Sunday, giving the league’s youngest head coach his first win.

Kenneth Walker III rushed for 84 of his 103 yards and a touchdown in the second half, sparking a comeback after a first half full of mistakes and sloppy fouls.

The Broncos led 13-9 at halftime, thanks in part to two safeties, but Walker changed the momentum in the third quarter when Seattle turned to the ground game again. He had 53 yards on five carries on Seattle’s first drive of the second half, capped by a 23-yard touchdown run. Walker had another TD called back on a penalty, but he still produced the seventh 100-yard rushing game of his career.

Walker appeared to injure himself on a 7-yard run early in the fourth quarter and didn’t play the rest of the game because of a muscle problem in his abdomen. Walker said he would be OK.

“When we went in and made adjustments, everyone was locked in. We were in a state of balance. Not everything went as planned, as you saw in the first half, but after making those adjustments, we just felt like we were playing better as a team,” Walker said.

Seattle quarterback Geno Smith was part of the early struggles for the Seahawks offense, but found a rhythm in the second half. Smith ran for a 34-yard touchdown in the second quarter — the longest run of his career — and hit Zach Charbonnet on a 30-yard touchdown pass on the first play of the fourth quarter to give Seattle a 26-13 lead.

Smith completed 18 of 25 passes for 171 yards.

“Once the running game got going, we were able to pick up the pace and start passing the ball and that’s when you really saw our offense come to life,” Smith said.

Macdonald won his debut after being hired as the youngest head coach in the NFL to lead Seattle forward after Pete Carroll’s 14 seasons as the franchise’s head coach. And he’ll be thrilled with the defensive performance for 3 1/2 quarters.

Denver rookie QB Bo Nix was 26 of 42 for 138 yards and was intercepted twice on careless throws — once by Julian Love at the Seattle 1 and the other by Riq Woolen in the fourth quarter. The Broncos finished with 231 total yards and committed three turnovers.

“I thought he seemed calm and poised,” Denver coach Sean Payton said of his rookie QB. “I felt like he was very comfortable and ready.”

Nix sparked a late drive that pulled the Broncos back to 26-20 with 2:09 left after scoring on a 4-yard run. But Seattle was able to run out the clock on Tyler Lockett’s one-handed catch to convert a third down, the last of his six receptions.

“Overall, I think as bad as we did, we gave ourselves a chance to win there at the end,” Nix said.

Safety dance

Denver scored twice on safeties, becoming only the second team since at least 1960 to score on two safeties in a season opener. Both safeties came in the second quarter — one when Anthony Bradford was penalized for holding in the end zone and later when Charbonnet failed to escape the end zone on a run play. The only other team since 1960 to score two safeties in a season opener was the New Orleans Saints against Cleveland in Week 1 in 1987.

Injuries

Seattle lost starting right tackle George Fant to a knee injury in the first quarter. Fant grabbed his right knee while blocking a pass play and needed help getting to the sideline. He was replaced by Stone Forsythe, and Macdonald said they aren’t sure how serious it is.

Denver left tackle Garrett Boles suffered an ankle injury in the second half and did not return, but Payton said he thinks Boles will be OK.

Next

Broncos: Host Pittsburgh next Sunday.

Seahawks: Next Sunday at New England.

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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl