Coaching in the NFL is a pathway to an amount of free time many consider to be unnatural.

Although he has a couch in his office, 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan did not spend Christmas Day at the team's Santa Clara facility ahead of their Week 17 showdown with the Seattle Seahawks. Since the 49ers played last Saturday, Shanahan gave the team -- and himself -- the day off to spend with their families, reasoning that the Niners still would have a normal amount of time to prepare for Sunday's winner-take-all game with the NFC West and regular-season conference crowns on the line for his team.

"It was a nice day," Shanahan told 49ers play-by-play broadcaster Greg Papa on this week's episode of 49ers Game Plan, which airs Saturday at 7 p.m. on NBC Bay Area. "There's not many times in the NFL you get a day like that. It kind of worked out perfect. At first, you think you're playing on Saturday and you're upset about the short week, but the way it worked out I'm very thankful we played Saturday because I don't think we'd have been able to do this if we did it Sunday."

Shanahan said his wife and three children usually see a movie on Christmas Day. The coach's choice was to see "Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise Of Skywalker," the final entry in the long-running space fantasy franchise's sequel trilogy.

His family, however, apparently had a bad feeling about this.

"I lost the vote," Shanahan told Papa. "We usually try to see a movie later on Christmas afternoon, and I was dying to see 'Star Wars.' I've been waiting for a while ... and I lost the vote. We went and saw ['Jumanji: The Next Level'], which was good, too. I'm a 'Jumanji' fan, but I'm still a little bitter about not seeing 'Star Wars.'"

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Shanahan and the 49ers didn't need any extra incentive to beat the Seahawks on Sunday, but a bye week would give him time to see "The Rise of Skywalker" before the divisional round, in addition to the whole "home-field advantage throughout the playoffs" thing. The 49ers wouldn't get either luxury if they lose the Seahawks, and they'd open the postseason against the NFC East winner during the NFC wild-card round next week.

But one can fend off spoilers for only so long, so Shanahan has to hope the Force is with the 49ers in Seattle.