The San Francisco 49ers kept their perfect start alive Sunday, outlasting the Arizona Cardinals 36-30 in a frantic NFC West shootout at Levi’s Stadium.
The win pushed San Francisco to 3-0 on the young 2026 season and gave Kyle Shanahan another milestone in a long-running run with the franchise. Shanahan tied Hall of Famer Bill Walsh with 166 career games coached for the 49ers. It also marked the second straight week he got the better of one of his former offensive assistants, this time beating Cardinals head coach Mike LaFleur, who spent four seasons under Shanahan in Santa Clara from 2017 to 2020.
For all the points and fireworks, though, this one came with a heavy price. The 49ers entered the day with just three defensive linemen who made the original 53-man roster, and the injury list kept growing as the game wore on. By the end, what should have felt like a statement win looked a lot more like a survival test.
San Francisco wasted no time setting the tone. After Arizona came up empty on its opening drive, the Cardinals had a chance to flip the field on the next punt but failed to pin the 49ers at the 1-yard line.
That mistake proved costly. Three plays later, Brock Purdy connected with Mike Evans on a short throw, Evans flipped a hook-and-ladder lateral to a sprinting Deebo Samuel, and Samuel raced 82 yards for a touchdown.
Tight end Luke Farrell delivered a key block downfield to help spring the play, and the 49ers had an opening-drive touchdown for the third straight game.
Purdy and the offense were rolling early. San Francisco piled up 150 yards in the first quarter and converted all three of its third downs, each one on 3rd-and-long. The momentum carried into the second quarter, when Purdy hit Evans for a touchdown to extend the lead.
Then came the injuries, and they came fast. Deommodore Lenoir left in the second quarter to be evaluated for a concussion after a violent collision with Fred Warner, though he eventually returned.
Mike Evans went out just before halftime with a rib injury and was ruled out for the rest of the game. Trent Williams was carted to the locker room in the second half and did not return after Vederian Lowe took over at left tackle.
Gracen Halton was hurt on an extra-point attempt in the third quarter, Renardo Green went into the medical tent and forced Jack Jones back into action, and Dre Greenlaw exited in the fourth quarter during a crucial goal-line stand.
Even with all that going on, San Francisco kept finding answers. Eddy Piñeiro drilled a season-long 57-yard field goal as the first half expired, and Christian McCaffrey opened the second half by leaping over a pile of defenders for a touchdown on a sharp drive.
The Cardinals weren’t done, though, and the game turned again on a special-teams disaster. Late in the third quarter with the 49ers leading 23-13, a punt hit a fallen San Francisco player and bounced into Arizona’s hands at the 29-yard line. Two defensive penalties on fourth-and-1 then gave the Cardinals 1st-and-goal at the 1, and rookie running back Jeremiyah Love caught a touchdown in the flat to pull Arizona within 23-20 with 13:06 remaining.
San Francisco answered right back. On George Kittle Bobblehead Day, Purdy led a clean drive and found Kittle in the end zone to make it 29-20, though Piñeiro missed another extra point.
Arizona kept pushing. Keion White delivered a big sack on first down, then Jacoby Brissett scrambled for a touchdown to cut the margin to 29-27 with less than three minutes left.
The 49ers looked ready to put it away when Purdy crossed the goal line on a run, but the score came off the board because of a holding penalty on Kittle. That only delayed the finish. Two plays later, with San Francisco facing 1st-and-goal from the 20, Purdy went right back to Kittle for a 20-yard touchdown, Kittle’s second of the day, to make it 36-27 with 1:30 to play.
Arizona still had one more response in it, driving for a 49-yard field goal with 39 seconds left after Shanahan tried to ice the kicker. That cut the lead to 36-30 and set up one final onside kick attempt, but Deebo Samuel handled the bouncing ball cleanly. Purdy then took a knee, and the 49ers escaped with the win.
In Other News...
49ers Suddenly Have A Mike Evans Problem They Couldn't Afford
A promising day for the passing game took an abrupt turn against Arizona when Mike Evans was forced out after taking a hit from Budda Baker. Evans had already been one of the 49ers most productive targets before the injury, hauling in multiple catches, including a touchdown and a lateral that helped set up another score, before showing clear discomfort and needing assistance to the locker room in the second quarter.
The rib injury left San Francisco without one of its most dangerous playmakers for the rest of the game, a setback no team wants in a matchup that had already been tilted by his early impact. With Evans unavailable, the focus shifted quickly from his production to how the 49ers would absorb the loss and whether the injury would carry into the days ahead. [Read more 🡒]
Deebo Samuel Just Had One Of The Strangest Stat Lines Ever
Deebo Samuel turned one of the 49ers most unusual offensive nights into a piece of NFL history against Arizona, scoring on an 80-yard hook-and-ladder touchdown without ever recording a reception. The play still counted as receiving yardage, and it pushed Samuel into the record book with the most receiving yards in a game without a catch, topping a mark that had stood since 1961.
It was the kind of line that only makes sense if you watched it unfold in real time, with Samuel also adding two rushing attempts for 14 yards to his final total. For San Francisco, it was another reminder of how the receiver can change a game in ways that dont always show up in the usual box-score categories, even if this one will be remembered mostly for how strange it looked on paper. [Read more 🡒]
49ers Suddenly Have A Trent Williams Problem They Could Not Afford
The 49ers came out of Week 3 already dealing with the kind of injury mess that can reshape a game plan in a hurry. Against the Cardinals, San Francisco lost wide receiver Mike Evans to a rib injury and saw left tackle Trent Williams leave with a stinger, leaving the offensive line situation even thinner at a spot the team could hardly afford to weaken.
Williams had been questionable to return, and his status now hangs over a unit that was already carrying depth concerns up front. For a team built to win with balance and control, any extended absence on the edge would force more shuffling and put even more pressure on the rest of the line to absorb the blows. [Read more 🡒]