Thomas B. Shea-USA TODAY Sports
If a Temple football fan wanted to take a macro view of a disappointing 24-13 loss to Houston in the AAC championship game on Saturday, the focus would have been on a great season that included a lot of firsts and securing a terrific bowl game. Thats the view Temple head coach Matt Rhulestressed afterward.
The micro view, though, was a blown opportunity to win a championship due to a number of brain cramps by the coaching staff. There is no guarantee that the Owls will be back in the title game next year and, if they arent, the coaches have no one but themselves to blame for a number of perplexing offensive miscues. With four minutes left, they seemed incapable of running a true two-minute offense, taking precious seconds off the clock by having the players stare over to the sidelines for plays. On one of them, the Owls wasted 24 seconds with dog stare offense, only to call a timeout. Twice within the last four minutes, they wasted more precious time on running plays up the middle.
The biggest brain cramp, though, came after closing the gap to 24-13 with 7:18 to go in the game. The Owls had a 3rd-and-3 at the Houston 38, but inexplicably attempted a long pass into the end zone. The call was made even more confounding because the Cougars wereplaying 10 yards off Temple wide receiver Robby Anderson on the play. A simplepitch and catch would have moved the sticks.
Moving the sticks there would have cured a lot of earlier self-imposed ills.
Early on, the players had just as much to do with it as the coaches, but after fighting back, they deserved a coaching staff that was more focused. The Owls have been a team all year whose motto was to not beat themselves by turning the ball over, but on their first drive of the game, quarterback P.J. Walker threw an interception. That resulted in a 7-0 lead for Houston. The Owls were driving for a tying touchdown when Anderson who caught 12 passes for 150 yards was fighting for yardage and fumbled the ball on the Houston 5-yard-line. That led to a 10-0 deficit.
Still, had the Owls registered a first downon that late 3rd-and-3 instead of taking the shot into the end zone, they might have scored to make it 24-20 (or 24-21 with a two-point conversion) and it would have been a whole different game. They followed that poor coaching call with a clinic in mismanagingthe clock and that sealed their doom.
While the physical errorsby the unpaid amateurs were understandable, the mental ones by the paid professional coaches were inexcusable.
Mike Gibson is a featured writer for RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @papreps , Like him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google.
Source: http://www.rantsports.com/ncaa-football/2015/12/06/temple-footballs-aac-title-loss-to-houston-direct-result-of-poor-coaching-decisions/
No comments:
Post a Comment