- Nov 9, 2015
- 7,401
- 4,168
Same as I felt after the LSU game. This team has glaring deficiencies most notably in how it's managed and coached. At this point whatever the players do on the field strategically reflects on Mullen - and if it's something he doesn't agree w/ then he should be like Saban, and let them know so they never forget again. I know he's not defensive, but he's nonetheless responsible there too. The crucial management/coaching errors I observed:
3 critical 3rd down stops negated by dumb penalties (21 points scored off).
Not taking an extra 20 seconds off the clock before scoring end of half TD (this was absolutely retarded, minimum 4 points lost there)
A few downs spent on designed RB rushes that all amounted to completely wasted plays.
Incredible lack of urgency, preparedness, and time management on final scoring drive (1 timeout wasted)
Ridiculously stupid 2pt conversation decision, made doubly stupid by wasting a timeout to do it (2nd timeout wasted)
Both timeouts were wasted when it was a near CERTAINTY we were going to need them. I can almost see using 1, so you only have 2 left, and possibly bait Bama into running (vs if we had 3 left, Bama possibly deciding to pass for the 1st, since we could stop the clock and get the ball back with lots of time anyway).
Mullen is frustrating. He needs to get substantially better at game management and strategy. He's too focused on offense alone. If he wants to be an OC, go do that. If you want to be a HC, he needs to get his head on straight and figure out if he continues to operate this way he'll never be elite. Which he is not.
While I agree in general the two point conversion was the correct call to have a change to win the game. The timing issue at the end of the half probably was not even thought of they wanted to score and did not want to give Bama more time to thwart it. The many mental mistakes were bad, but I saw similar in several games so sometimes it is the combination of routes that causes the errors.