The list of possible opponents for the Seahawks’ season-opening game at Lumen Field was cut by two Monday morning,
The NFL announced that the Dallas Cowboys will play at the New York Giants on the opening Sunday night of the NFL season, eliminating each as possibilities to play at Seattle that weekend.
Each are teams the Seahawks are scheduled to play at Lumen Field at some point in the 2026 season.
The NFL has already revealed that the Seahawks will play at Lumen Field on Sept. 9, a Wednesday, in the NFL season opener and a night when the Seahawks will also unveil the banner commemorating the Super Bowl win in February
The elimination of the Giants and Cowboys appears to reduce to just four the possible opponents for the Seahawks’ season opener.
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It also cannot be either the 49ers or Rams as they are set to play on Thursday in the first-ever NFL regular season game in Australia.
And it apparently won’t be the Kansas City Chiefs as their owner, Clark Hunt, said at the NFL league meetings in March that “I don’t think that’s on the table” to play in the season opener at Seattle.
Hunt said that because it’s unclear exactly when quarterback Patrick Mahomes will be ready to return from a knee injury that “my guess is the league won’t want to take that risk” of scheduling the Chiefs for that game.
That appears to leave four teams scheduled to play in the Seahawks in 2026 who could still be options — Chicago, New England, the Los Angeles Chargers and Arizona.
Given the marquee nature of the game, most have figured for a while that the likely opponent would be either the Bears, who advanced to the NFC divisional round last season and have an emerging superstar in quarterback Caleb Williams entering his third season, or the Patriots as a rematch of the Super Bowl.
Much speculation of late has focused on the Bears as the likely opponent, because of their status as a team on the rise after their improvement a year ago under rookie head coach Ben Johnson.
There has also been speculation the NFL could be wary of scheduling New England for that game and having the night overshadowed by the lingering controversy surrounding head coach Mike Vrabel and his reported relationship with NFL reporter Dianna Russini. Another could simply be a worry that the game would be another blowout, along the lines of the Super Bowl itself.
The answer will come this week as the NFL will release the entire schedule for the 2026 regular season on Thursday at 5 p.m.
The league announced last week that “select games” will be revealed during the week by various schedule partners, which is why the news of the Giants-Cowboys game was unveiled on Monday morning.
That game will be televised on NBC as will the regular season opener at Lumen Field
Each team’s opponents were set at the end of the 2025 season based on the league’s scheduling formula, but dates, times and TV/streaming designations are not determined until the spring.
Along with finding out who they will play in the regular-season opener, the Seahawks this week will also learn if they will play an international game this season.
The NFL announced that it will officially announce all of the matchups for its nine international games on Wednesday morning at 6 a.m. on Good Morning Football on the NFL Network.
At least one team has been set for all nine of the games, and there are two for which Seattle remains a possibility — a game hosted by Washington at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London that is speculated as likely to be played in October, or a game against the 49ers in Mexico City that is speculated as being held in November.
The Seahawks will play each team on the road this season.
They have played two games as part of the league’s International Series — a win over the Raiders in London in 2018 and a loss to Tampa Bay in Munich in 2022.
Bob Condotta: bcondotta@seattletimes.com. Bob Condotta is a sports reporter at The Seattle Times who primarily covers the Seahawks but also dabbles in other sports. He has worked at The Times since 2002, reporting on University of Washington Husky football and basketball for his first 10 years at the paper before switching to the Seahawks in 2013.