Philadelphia, PA (My Sportsbook) - The Seattle Seahawks have never been an organization known for their immediacy.

It took the franchise until its 30th season to make its first Super Bowl appearance, for instance. Head coach Mike Holmgren, brought to the Emerald City in 1999 to turn the Seahawks into a contender as he had the Packers, took seven years to lead the club to as much as a postseason victory.

And when the Seahawks followed up a 37-6 pounding at the hands of the Bears by digging themselves a 21-7 hole in a first-place NFC West battle with St. Louis on Sunday, and again looked dead and buried when the Rams took a 28-27 lead with 1:44 to play, the pundits began dusting off all of the "runner-up curse" talk, figuring that Seattle, as always, had just taken a while to catch up to its destiny.

After all, the dreaded "C" word, the one that rhymes with hearse, had already reared its ugly head for Seattle this season. When Hawks running back Shaun Alexander suffered a cracked bone in his left foot on Sept. 24th, in turn continuing the "Madden cover curse" that previously sidelined video game cover men Donovan McNabb, Ray Lewis, Michael Vick, Marshall Faulk, and Daunte Culpepper, it looked like some of that old black magic might be following Holmgren's team around. With the Chicago debacle framed large in the team's rear view mirror, a loss to St. Louis on Sunday was going to give rise to all sort of grand pronouncements about the Seahawks' imminent demise.

But Holmgren and company shut down the storyline before it could be penned, and they shut it down not once, but twice.

After going into the break down 14 and showing little ability to consistently stop the St. Louis passing game, the Seahawks tightened up defensively against Marc Bulger and the Rams attack. Matt Hasselbeck and the Seattle offense took a little while to come to life, but made some headway when Hasselbeck hit Darrell Jackson on a 42-yard touchdown with 4:28 to play in the third quarter.

On their next three drives, two of which came off of short fields, the Hawks ended thusly: field goal, touchdown, field goal, with Deion Branch catching his second touchdown pass of the day to put Seattle ahead.

With the Seahawks up, 27-21, and the Rams pinned deep into their own territory at around the two-minute mark, it looked as though Seattle would complete an important and impressive comeback. Then Bulger threw a 67-yard touchdown strike to Torry Holt with 1:44 to play, the Edward Jones Dome exploded, and the hex looked to have new life.

But this Seattle team is apparently not affected by doomsday thinking.

Despite an absence of timeouts, Hasselbeck coolly led Seattle on an eight- play, 52-yard drive down to the St. Louis 31. An illegal formation penalty accrued as Bulger attempted to spike the ball backed the Seahawks up five yards, and on trotted Josh Brown for a 54-yard field goal attempt.

The Rams tried to ice Brown. Brown walked around, looking calm during the timeout, then nailed the kick, dead solid perfect, to give Seattle first place in the division race once again.

You heard it here first - the Seahawks will not relinquish that division lead.

Take a look at the remaining schedule. There are a few tough games, including trips to Kansas City and Denver and a home date with the Chargers, but otherwise, there are enough 49ers and Cardinals and Raiders and Packers on the schedule to pretty much ensure that Seattle walks into the playoffs. St. Louis will remain Seattle's closest division competitor, but when the Rams come into Qwest Field in four weeks time, we're willing to bet the Seahawks will be on the verge of eliminating them from serious contention.

Alexander, who is expected to return next week against the Vikings, should be back in full swing by that time.

With first-year Seattle receivers like Branch and Nate Burleson better integrated into the offensive scheme, and tight end Jerramy Stevens sufficiently recovered from his knee injury and ready to contribute, the offense should be running at optimum efficiency by that encircled date with St. Louis on Nov. 12th.

The underrated defense, one that experienced notable lapses in the secondary on Sunday but also harassed Bulger into six sacks and an interception, should be at its attacking best.

Should Seattle hold serve and win the games it should in the coming weeks, look for Holmgren's squad to challenge current media darling Chicago at the top of the NFC hierarchy as the regular season nears its conclusion. By that point, the curse talk will be long gone. The Seahawks will have already become the first Super Bowl runner-up to return to the postseason in the next campaign since the 1999 Tennessee Titans, with an eye toward becoming the first such team to make it back onto the Super Sunday stage since the 1992 Buffalo Bills.

There will be those that continue to doubt the staying power of a Seahawks team that was its own worst enemy for so long a period, one that seemed to take two steps back every time it put its best foot forward.

After Sunday's thrilling and gutty win, however, it might be time to acknowledge that Seattle is past any would-be curses, jinxes, or superstitions, and is beyond any historical skeletons lurking in the franchise's closet.

It might be time to admit that the Seahawks have turned the corner and become one of the NFL's top organizations. And admit it immediately.