By Bob Condotta

The Seattle Times

Seahawks middle linebacker Bobby Wagner plans to “ignore” a sprained ankle suffered Sunday against Carolina and keep playing, coach Pete Carroll said during his radio show Monday on 710 ESPN Seattle.

But Carroll said free safety Quandre Diggs has an injury “high” on his ankle and didn’t rule out that he might miss Sunday’s home game against Arizona.

Carroll also held out hope the four other defensive starters who missed Sunday’s game — defensive ends Jadeveon Clowney and Ziggy Ansah, strongside linebacker Mychal Kendricks and cornerback Shaquill Griffin — could all return. But he portrayed Griffin, who is dealing with a hamstring injury, as the most questionable.

Wagner left the game on the second play of Carolina’s second-to-last series of the game with 7 minutes, 2 seconds remaining and was not cleared to return. But Wagner said after the game he did not think the injury was significant: “I’m doing fine. I’m good.”

Carroll said Monday that Wagner is “going to try to ignore this injury. He doesn’t think it’s going to be a factor, but we’ll see.”

While the Seahawks were largely able to survive without the five other missing starters (Diggs played just 35 of 72 snaps), losing Wagner proved hard to overcome.

When Wagner left, the Panthers finished off the rest of that 75-yard drive for a touchdown, then drove 84 yards for another the next time they had the ball without Wagner on the field.

The Panthers had 146 yards on the 14 plays Wagner missed, or an average of 10.4 yards per play, compared with 268 yards on 58 before he was hurt, or 4.6 yards per play.

Carroll noted the Seahawks were in a lot of zone/prevent defense without Wagner — at which time Seattle was without six defensive starters — and “played it kind of soft. Played safe. Kind of rope-a-doped our way to a win.” (Carroll said it “looked like preseason” at times, with so many young players on the field).

Seattle played the second half without Diggs, replaced by Lano Hill, who left for a few plays himself late and was replaced by rookie Marquise Blair.

Hill might be in line to get the start for the next week or two if Diggs can’t make it back.

Carroll said Diggs got “a high ankle shot there, so we have to see how that goes. We don’t know at this point.”

Diggs left the locker room wearing a boot on the ankle.

Diggs, acquired in a trade with Detroit for a fifth-round pick in October, has three interceptions and the Seahawks have forced 16 turnovers in five games since he entered the starting lineup for a victory over the host San Francisco 49ers.

As for Clowney, Carroll reiterated what he said after the game that he was “violently ill” Friday and the team felt it best for him not to make the trip to Carolina. But assuming the illness passes, Clowney should be able to return this week.

Carroll said Ansah, who has missed the last two games with neck/shoulder issues, is scheduled to practice this week, adding the report he received on him Monday was the best they’ve had in awhile. “Counting on him to come back,” Carroll said.

Kendricks has missed the past two games with a hamstring injury and did not make the trip to Charlotte. Carroll said Kendricks was left behind “so he can get special treatments” and that “he’s dying to get out there.”

Rookie Cody Barton from Utah has filled in at strongside linebacker the last two games and had 10 tackles Sunday.

Carroll said Griffin is a somewhat trickier case because he’s dealing with a hamstring injury and “he’s a sprinter. Have to wait until the end of the week. We won’t know.”

Akeem King got what was his second start of the season and played every snap in place of Griffin at left cornerback.

Carroll said of King after the game: “He did fine. He really didn’t have many chances out there, I didn’t feel like. Everything was pretty much underneath and we zoned up a bunch of stuff and took care of him a little bit. He did a nice job to get through the game.”