Fred Warner had a pretty succinct summary of the San Francisco 49ers' 27-7 win over the Los Angeles Rams in Week 1: They got better as the game went on, while their opponents got worse.
Expect, he said it a little more brutally than that.
"I think it was definitely a matter of us feeling like we got stronger as the game went on," Warner said in his postgame press conference
. "The opposing team, it felt like they kinda withered away."After the Rams grabbed a brief 7-3 lead on a Kyren Williams touchdown run early in the second quarter, San Francisco reeled off 24 unanswered points, including 17 in the second half, to turn a one-score game into a blowout win. Demarcus Robinson's 39-yard touchdown catch put the 49ers back on top before the half, and
Brock Purdy added scoring strikes to Mike Evans and Deebo Samuel in the third and fourth quarters to pull away. Eddy Pineiro capped the scoring with a 56-yard field goal.
Purdy was the engine behind the surge, finishing 25-of-34 for 205 yards and three touchdowns despite an early interception. San Francisco also won the turnover battle, with Renardo Green picking off Matthew Stafford in the second quarter and Keion White recovering a fumble that Warner himself forced.
By the fourth quarter, the wheels had fully come off for Los Angeles. Stafford finished just 15-of-25 for 155 yards with the pick, and with the 49ers up 20 points and 3:29 remaining, the Rams turned to backup Stetson Bennett IV to close out the game, a clear sign the night had gotten away from them.
Now, could Warner have been referencing the dichotomy of the teams' travel plans? Maybe. The 49ers arrived a week before the game to train, while the Rams arrived a day before the game. Nevertheless, the result was a win for San Francisco and a loss for Los Angeles in one of the most-contested division in the NFL.
This article originally appeared on Niners Wire: 49ers LB Fred Warner says Rams 'withered away' in Week 1
