Ricky Watters said he expects to play in Sunday's AFC wild-card game.

After a bizarre and fortunate finish to the regular season, the Seattle Seahawks came to work this week and saw a division championship banner hanging on the side of their team headquarters.

It was Seattle's second division title in franchise history. The team is headed to the playoffs for the first time since 1988, ending the NFL's longest playoff drought.

But the players can be forgiven for wishing it had happened a little differently. They reached the playoffs because Kansas City lost its Sunday contest with Oakland on a Raiders' field goal in overtime. Seattle lost its final regular season game, 19-9 to the New York Jets on the road.

Cornerback Willie Williams, a playoff veteran from his years in Pittsburgh, said the honor was bittersweet.

"It feels good to be in the playoffs, but it would be much sweeter if we would have beaten the Jets," he said.

Having the AFC West championship took away some of the sting of the last six weeks, when the Seahawks lost five of six games.

But not all of it. Against the Jets, Seattle's offense didn't score a touchdown and the defense gave up a career-high 158 rushing yards to Curtis Martin.

"We cannot win a playoff game if we play like we did against the Jets," said Williams, who played in four playoffs and a Super Bowl in Pittsburgh from 1993-96.

Asked if he felt like an AFC West champion, Williams said: "Personally, I don't. We just don't have that feeling yet because we lost against the Jets."

The Seahawks (9-7) will play Miami (9-7) in an AFC wild-card game on Sunday in the Kingdome.

In the Jets' game, the Seahawks offense was hampered by a subpar Ricky Watters, who played with a brace on his sprained right knee. Watters was restricted to 30 yards on nine carries.

"I'm really excited for the whole franchise and everybody to be able to go to the playoffs," Watters said. "But when you lose five of the last six, there's got to be a bad taste in everybody's mouth.

"We have not been getting the job done. I hope everybody feels the same way. If we keep playing the way we've been playing, is it going to matter? We're going to get beat."

Having a healthy Watters is especially important to take some of the pressure off Jon Kitna, who's in his first season as Seattle's starting quarterback. Kitna was 21-for-45 for 237 yards passing and was intercepted twice by the Jets.

Watters came in early Monday morning so he could do some weight lifting to strengthen his legs. He hopes to be 100 percent by this weekend.

"Against the Jets, I was just trying to get out there and give my team a spark and help jump start the team," he said. "But that wasn't me out there."

Because he was limited in his practice work last week, Watters said his right leg became fatigued in the Jets' game.

Holmgren was hired away from Green Bay in January to get the Seahawks back to the playoffs. In his first season as coach in Seattle, he has put a team in the postseason for the seventh consecutive year.

Only Hall of Fame coaches Tom Landry (nine in Dallas from 1975-83) and Chuck Noll (eight in Pittsburgh from 1972-79) have longer playoff streaks than Holmgren.

With a Seahawks' victory over Miami, Holmgren, who had a 9-5 playoff record with the Packers, could tie George Seifert and Dan Reeves, who have 10 playoff victories each, for the most victories among active coaches. Bill Parcells, who stepped down as coach of the Jets on Monday, had 11.

Holmgren admitted he felt fortunate to be in the playoffs.

"You need to be lucky. You need the ball to bounce a certain way on occasion," he said. "I'll take anybody's luck who was up here. Usually, that won't get you to the Super Bowl, though. But it can win you a game now and then."

The Seahawks fans didn't care how their team made the playoffs.