NFL.com Columnist DENVER -- We're halfway through the Divisional Round and it's apparent that injuries might end up defining what we saw this weekend. The Denver Broncos left Saturday with bittersweet feelings after advancing to the AFC Championship Game and learning that quarterback Bo Nix is done for the season with a broken ankle. The San Francisco 49ers finally realized how far they could go with an injury-riddled roster, especially when a team as impressive as the Seattle Seahawks is lined up across from them. One game turned into an instant classic. The other was a colossal mismatch. We now have two more games coming on Sunday -- the Texans travel to New England while the Bears host the Rams -- but it's a good time for this installment of The First Read to focus on winners and losers after Saturday's action. After all, there were plenty of those to go around ... 1) Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold: There was only one demon left for Darnold to conquer this year and that involved his playoff reputation. Everybody who watched him in last year's Wild Card Round saw a jittery quarterback who melted down in a blowout loss to the Rams. That wasn't the guy who walked into Lumen Field for a Divisional Round matchup with San Francisco on Saturday night. Darnold had the comfort of knowing he was playing at home with a loaded roster that had earned the top seed in the NFC. All he had to do was be himself and not let an oblique injury that popped up late in the week bother him. Darnold did his part by completing 12 of 17 passes for 124 yards and a touchdown in a 41-6 win. He let his teammates handle the rest, which they gladly did. This always felt like a game that Seattle could run away with because of all the injuries that had plagued the 49ers this season. That's exactly what it became, which was great for Darnold. He already had made the transition from gunslinger to game manager midway through the season. Saturday's game only reiterated how important it is for him to avoid turnovers along with the feeling of having to go win the game for the Seahawks. There clearly will be a tougher challenge facing this team next week, regardless of whether it's the Bears or Rams that come to Seattle for the NFC Championship Game. One thing that should also be obvious is that Darnold learned some valuable lessons from last year's late-season struggles. 2) Broncos head coach Sean Payton: Let's be clear here -- Payton couldn't afford to go one-and-done after the regular season the Broncos enjoyed. This team broke the Kansas City Chiefs' nine-year run as AFC West champions. It captured the top seed in the AFC postseason bracket and displayed impressive resolve in going 11-2 in one-score games. All that was supposed to be part of the magic Payton was tasked with delivering when the Broncos hired him in 2023. Losing in the Divisional Round after such a successful year would've been an epic failure, especially in a postseason as wide open as this one. The Broncos did what they had to do to earn a 33-30 overtime win over Buffalo on Saturday. Payton had a smart game plan for quarterback Bo Nix to execute, and the Denver defense made several momentum-altering plays to stifle Bills quarterback Josh Allen and the Buffalo offense. Payton made it clear that he wanted to be aggressive in this contest, and you saw Nix throw deep shots time and again when Buffalo used man coverage. Payton also had to compensate for a run game that only created 70 total yards and a receiving corps plagued by injuries early in the contest. Of course, the job now becomes far more challenging for the head coach as his team moves into the AFC Championship Game. Nix sustained a broken ankle on the last drive in overtime, an injury that ended his season. If the Broncos are going to win Super Bowl LX, it will be with Jarrett Stidham under center. It's obviously a huge blow, but backup quarterbacks have won championships in emergency duty before. It just means Payton will have to do more amazing things than he's already done with this team. 3) Seahawks wide receiver Rashid Shaheed: The acquisition of Shaheed has turned into one of the best midseason trades of the season. His speed has provided a big-play dimension to the Seahawks offense, and his special teams contributions have been just as critical to the team's success. Any questions about whether Seattle would be rusty after enjoying a bye during the Wild Card Round were answered after the 49ers kicked off to start the game. Shaheed returned the ball 95 yards for a touchdown and literally gave Seattle all the points it needed for the rest of the night. Now let's rewind to Week 16, when the Seahawks trailed the Rams by 16 points with a little less than 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter. Seattle needed some miracles to mount a comeback in that situation and Shaheed responded with a punt return for a touchdown to start that rally. These are the types of plays that help teams win championships. The Seahawks don't have to feed the ball to Shaheed -- and they've been more conservative offensively in the second half of this season -- but his presence and versatility make a big difference for Darnold and this offense. 4) Broncos defense: There are many things that Denver does exceptionally well on defense. Forcing turnovers wasn't one of them until Buffalo came to town on Saturday. The Broncos created five takeaways in the Divisional Round win over the Bills, which is crazy when considering that same unit produced 14 turnovers all year. This was an area Payton had emphasized during the bye week and it was vital that his team seized every opportunity that came its way. The Broncos couldn't outgain the Bills, as Buffalo amassed 449 yards to Denver's 349. The Bills also converted 10 of 15 third-down situations. So, when it came down to the difference in the contest, it was the way those turnovers swung the game for Denver. A fumble by Josh Allen with two seconds left in the first half turned into a Wil Lutz field goal. A strip-sack of Allen on Buffalo's first possession after halftime set up another Lutz field goal. Of course, the play of the game came when Broncos cornerback Ja'Quan McMillian outfought Bills wide receiver Brandin Cooks on a deep pass in overtime to create an interception that thwarted Buffalo's last best chance at securing a win. A Cooks catch on that play would have set up a makeable field goal for the Bills. Instead, Denver took the ball and drove down for what became Lutz's fourth and final field goal of the day. The Broncos were already a nightmare for opposing offenses when it came to categories like sacks, red zone defense and points allowed. If this unit is going to continue taking the ball away like it did on Saturday, it might be good enough to make up for the loss of Nix. 5) Seahawks running back Kenneth Walker III: Walker has been finding his groove in recent weeks, which is a great sign for the NFC West champions. Walker ran for 116 yards and scored three touchdowns in Seattle's win over San Francisco. It shouldn't be surprising that he had a big day against the 49ers -- the Seahawks ran for 180 yards against San Francisco in Week 18 -- but Walker's production had been inconsistent earlier this season. He's now rushed for at least 97 yards in three of his last four games. More impressively, he's averaged nearly six yards per carry over the past month. You take a player heating up like that and combine his talents with Zach Charbonnet (who sustained a knee injury on Saturday) and you can see why Darnold isn't pressing anymore. If that run game keeps grinding away, the Seahawks offense is going to continue creating more headaches for anybody who gets in its way. 1) Broncos quarterback Bo Nix: There was every reason to think Nix would be the ultimate winner on Saturday night, right until Sean Payton returned to the interview room and announced his second-year quarterback's season had ended with a broken ankle. Nix had spent an entire game proving that he was ready for the postseason stage. He finished with good numbers (279 passing yards, three touchdowns and an interception), but his best work occurred in those high-leverage moments that have become Denver's trademark this season. Nix led his team to a go-ahead score in the final minute when Buffalo had all the momentum and a reason to a think another playoff upset was in the making. He hit Courtland Sutton with a crucial 25-yard pass on a third-and-11 during that drive and connected with Marvin Mims Jr. on a 26-yard touchdown toss. It's equally important to note that Nix played well despite losing some key receivers to injuries and the Broncos running backs producing all of 41 yards. The narrative around Nix all season had been that he was a player who could be maddeningly inconsistent until it mattered most. Well, he proved he was more than ready to lead this team to the Super Bowl. Unfortunately, he'll have to watch and hope the Broncos can now reach that summit without him. 2) Bills quarterback Josh Allen: There isn't much left to say about Allen when it comes to postseason defeats. He's dealt with some heartbreakers over the course of his career, but this one should hurt a bit more because of his role. We usually talk about the Buffalo supporting cast failing Allen in critical situations when the Bills lose in the playoffs. This time around, he was a big part of the problem. The same quarterback who's been phenomenal throughout his postseason career -- he hadn't given the ball away once in his last six playoff games -- ended up with four turnovers. Allen fumbled three times and lost two of those while also throwing two interceptions. Some of those turnovers came down to a Denver defender making a great play, like the one McMillian made in ripping the ball away from Cooks in overtime for that interception. At other times, it was Allen simply trying to do too much, when he lost the football while scrambling with two seconds left in the first half and set up a Will Lutz field goal after Denver recovered that mishap. It's fair to say the Bills would have won that game if Allen could have avoided one of those turnovers. Since he didn't, this ends up being another year where Buffalo fans are left to wonder what it will take for this team to win a championship during his tenure. It's been said many times that Allen was poised to benefit from a postseason without Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow and Lamar Jackson playing. Turns out that advantage didn't take the Bills any farther than they've already been in recent years. 3) 49ers offense: Saturday's game with Seattle was never going to be a fair fight, not with all the issues the 49ers faced heading into it. For all the great work head coach Kyle Shanahan has done with a team beaten down by injuries, there was no way Seattle's defense was going to allow an upset with that kind of advantage. The Seahawks toyed with the 49ers in a season-ending win that decided the NFC West and top seed. Did we really think San Francisco had enough firepower left to deal with that unit after losing tight end George Kittle to a season-ending Achilles tear in the Wild Card Round? Give Shanahan and his team credit for beating Philadelphia last weekend. The problem with that win is it gave Seattle no reason to underestimate the 49ers coming into this one. The Seahawks allowed only 236 total yards on Saturday, which amounted to a paltry 3.9 yards per play. They also neutralized All-Pro running back Christian McCaffrey, who played through a stinger injury but was held to 35 rushing yards and 39 receiving yards. The 49ers deserved all the credit in the world for what they accomplished in the face of so much adversity. But it was very likely that a beatdown was coming after so many setbacks, and that's exactly what happened this weekend. 4) Bills head coach Sean McDermott: You can't write about another disappointing postseason finish for Josh Allen without talking about what it means for his head coach. These two have been tied to each other ever since Allen arrived in Buffalo in 2018. They also both face more scrutiny than anybody else in that franchise when the playoffs conclude with another soul-crushing defeat. This year was always going to be a tougher challenge for McDermott's team because the Bills needed to win three playoff games on the road to reach the Super Bowl. They managed to earn one victory in Jacksonville in last weekend's Wild Card Round, but few teams can weather five turnovers and keep advancing in the postseason. McDermott now moves into an offseason where there will once again be more debates about how far he can take this team. The New England Patriots have turned into a power again in the AFC East, and they have the look of a team that isn't going to be a one-hit wonder. There also are a few high-profile former head coaches available on the open market for teams looking to make a change and bolster their chances of winning a championship. McDermott has been one of the best coaches in the league throughout his nine-year tenure in Buffalo. That doesn't mean there won't be chatter about what somebody like former Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin could do with a squad as talented as the Bills. Sure, the odds of that happening aren’t great. But we're also living in a world where Tomlin and John Harbaugh (who is now with the Giants after Baltimore fired him) are no longer with the teams they spent years coaching. 5) Bills running back James Cook: Cook might have been the star of the game if Buffalo had pulled out that win against Denver. He ran for a game-high 117 yards on 24 carries and was the best player on the field for long stretches of the first half. In fact, it felt like the Bills were taking control of the game behind Cook's effectiveness until a second-quarter fumble at Denver's 32-yard line changed the game. Buffalo led 7-3 at that point. After linebacker Alex Singleton popped the ball loose from Cook -- and safety Talanoa Hufanga recovered it -- the momentum swing was palpable. That miscue turned out to be ominous because it was the first of five Bills turnovers. Who knows how much damage Cook could have done on Saturday if Buffalo had been more careful with the football? The Broncos certainly knew a huge key to the game was stopping him. They didn't succeed entirely but the fumble proved to be just enough to make a critical difference in the outcome.