Recap Thread San Francisco 49ers 17, Oakland Raiders 9: Finally!

Well the first win of the season finally came. Three quarters of awful football from both teams and then the 49ers stepped it up the last quarter. The biggest surprise of all is that the 49ers had zero turnovers this game. No interceptions and no fumbles. Coming into this game they had been ranked dead last in turnover differential leading to 43 points for the opponents.

By limiting the mistakes the team assured themselves of victory.

Frank Gore had his best game of the season with 149 yards on 25 carries.

Alex Smith played pedestrian football but without any of the costly turnovers as in past games. He would finish with 16 completions on 33 attempts, 196 yards and 2 TDs.

Anthony Dixon saw very little playing time, but he did have a touchdown run called back due to a holding penalty.

This game reminds me a great deal of the Thursday night football game vs Chicago last year. Both teams played ugly football but the Niners got the win based on stellar defensive play. In this game the 49ers defense finally decided to show up. Takeo Spikes had one interception and Manny Lawson had another. Taylor Mays came very near to contributing a third.

The defense turned in two sacks (one from Ricky Jean-Francois and one from Parys Harlason.

So where does this leave us for the season? Do you feel confident that the team will play well enough to contend for the division after the horrific 0-5 start?

What about Alex Smith? His play today wasn't bad enough to lose him the starting job but it sure didn't inspire confidence in the long term success of the 49ers.