49ers’ defense throttled Washington in ’81

Long before Bill Walsh wore the tag of genius and his “West Coast offense” caught the fancy of coaches throughout the NFL, his 49ers had to learn a few fundamental rules of football.

You have to win on the road.

You have to beat bad teams. And you have to play defense.

In Week 5 of the 1981 season, they checked off all three boxes.

Continuing their transcontinental travels (Week 1 in Detroit, Week 3 in Atlanta), the 49ers flew into the nation’s capital and throttled Washington in a not-nearly-as-close-as-it-looks 30-17 beatdown that dropped rookie coach Joe Gibbs’ team to 0-5.

The 49ers led 14-0 after the first quarter, 24-3 at the half and 30-3 entering the final quarter.

And as noteworthy as the road win was — the 49ers had lost 26 of their previous 28 away from Candlestick Park — the attention-grabbing aspect of this one was the play of the defense.

The Ronnie Lott- and Dwight Hicks-led unit forced six turnovers (four interceptions and a pair of fumble recoveries), had two sacks, didn’t allow a passing touchdown, held Washington to 3.6 yards per rush (23 carries, 83 yards), and allowed only one TD (Washington’s second came on a punt return).

Hicks was the headliner with a pair of defensive touchdowns and 184 return yards. He scored on an 80yard fumble return and a 32-yard interception return and returned another pick 72 yards without scoring. The 104 interception return yards remains a single-game franchise record.

Hicks’ two TDs gave the 49ers three defensive scores in two weeks. Before Lott’s interception return against the Saints in Week 4, San Francisco had gone three years since the defense last scored.

The game’s forever highlight came on the fumble return. On its first possession, Washington — trailing 7-0 — had moved to the 49ers’ 22 when Terry Metcalf took an end-around and was trying to turn the corner when Lott came flying in and blasted the ball out of his hands. It went up about 6 feet and fell into the hands of Hicks, who hurdled Lott and Metcalf and easily outran QB Joe Theismann to score.

The game was nothing short of miserable for Theismann. In his fourth season as Washington’s full-time starter, Theismann completed 10 of 24 for 123 yards with two interceptions — Gibbs pulling him after the second one. Theismann would finish his career having made 124 starts; his QB rating of 23.4 against the 49ers that day would go down as his second worst (only the 20.6 against the Rams in 1978 was lower).

“They remind me a lot of us in 1979,” said 49ers’ right guard Randy Cross of the team that went 2-14 in Walsh’s first year. “A lot of talent, but a lot of self-destruct.”

Acquiring even more talent was precisely what the 49ers had in mind even before the team left the East Coast.

The first item in Chronicle beat writer Ira Miller’s notebook said 49ers exec John McVay was flying to San Diego the day after the Washington game to talk contract terms with the Chargers’ Fred Dean. Despite the improved play of the defense, the 49ers’ front office knew it would need all the help it could get for its next game.

In Week 6, the Cowboys were coming to town.