If they get a first down, there are zero seconds left on the clock. Get the first down then take knees. Zero worries about a hail mary or missed FG or FG block.
Franklin quote from recent interview
- Thread starter grinagrin
- Start date
I was referring to the home game in 2018 when MSU came in beat up, injured and without many starters and D’Antonio still found a way to out coach CJF.
So like I said, they needed a first down in order win the game without any chance of giving the ball back to Indiana. A blocked FG returned for a td has never ever happened in a Penn State game before I know.
And they had like the 125th best passing defense in the country........and we couldn't throw on them to save our life.
One of the most frustrating, inept games I've ever witnessed. Aside from Sander's Barkley-like run.
And despite it all, Amani O could have sealed it with an easy pick. I guess it was only appropriate that he dropped it and then MSU converts that BS deep pass to beat us. Whatever could go wrong pretty much did in that game.
And you aren't getting a first down without the defense falling over and everyone in the game knows that. You have no point. They gave the ball to a nervous kid in his first game ever on the road. ..he had no clue.
What? Penn State got 27 first downs against that defense. They weren't falling down for every single one of them.
I do have point: the strategy was fine. The execution was not fine.
You can argue that the execution still comes back to coaching, but it was not a "coaching decision" that lost the game.
Furthermore, "They gave the ball to a nervous kid in his first game ever on the road. ..he had no clue." is incorrect. Ford played in 12 games his freshman year 2019 (including at Iowa, at Maryland, at MSU, at Minny and the bowl game). He was not a clueless freshman in 2020; he was a seasoned sophomore who at that point in the game was RB1.
So Franklin takes 3 knees and kicks the FG and then this happens.
Everyone here pissed off he didn't take 3 knees is now pissed off Franklin got timid and didn't go for the kill.
It's possible to love Franklin and his staff while at the same time realizing that 2020 Indiana was pathetic. You should try it instead of tripping all over yourself defending it: Meyer was on moments later telling everyone the obvious: you take 3 knees.
The coaching decision is, you tell your questions to take 3 knees...the other option is you tell your qb to run some extra seconds then slide.
If Meyer was on "moments later" saying that then he changed his mind when he had his film room session with Dinardo, later on.
Does the coach in this scenario know how many years his players have been in program? Just curious.
That ball was actually darn near uncatchable given how poorly it was thrown. Regardless, the blowout 100% uncompetitive loss to Michigan is what kept us out of the playoffs, not the loss to Pitt.
It was not an easily catchable ball, but it is one that he catches 9 times out of 10.
Even with the blowout loss to UM, I don't see how there is any way they could keep a 1 loss Big Ten Champ out of the playoff.
Hits. Him. In. The. Hands. = Catchable. Especially for Hamilton. Don't kid yourself - we win that game we're in the playoff. Michigan is one loss and we would have the edge over OSU (head to head and conference champ). So, that game killed us. Way more than Michigan, especially since it's Pitt and we dropped a gimme at the end.
Nonsense. You exaggerate. The ball was almost uncatchable. It was thrown too far down field and over the wrong shoulder. Hamilton is not Calvin Johnson.
2015 Maryland shouldn't bother you...because we won!
Never seen where Urb wanted a time out there and I was there live as well as watching over a dozen times.
It is absolutely the correct option. It is the option with the least chance of failure due to the field position. I was losing my mind when they weren’t in victory formation. I am a huge Franklin fan but the at was a not a good decision. 3 knees. On fourth roll the QB out and go down before being hit or throw it through the end zone with a receiver in the area. One play to go 85 yards. Game over with no player slippage.
I have seen teams do exactly what we were trying to do in college and NFL many times. Ford should have gone down. The whole sideline was yelling at him to go down. He literally tripped over the goal line (did he think it was the 5?). Finally, we should have been able to protect an 8 point lead.
Yes but he didn’t. I have seen that many times before as well. The Detroit Lions lost that weekend the same way.
The same bozos who complain about Franklin's questionable calls over the years will never give him credit for the 11 win seasons or the way he brought the program back to a level that we hadn't really been since the 90s. I am discounting 2020 because it was 2020. But 2016-2019 were a great 4 year stretch and I am looking for more. Remember we had (I believe) fewer than 65 scholarship players in 2015. So, I really don't care what his record was in 2014-15.
At some point you trust your players. Maybe the fact that he was really 3rd string had something to do with it. But he should have gone down.
To keep beating the dead horse, in spite of *everything* that happened up to this point in that game, this is an important point to make.
The defense had given up something like 110 yards all afternoon, the score in no way reflected the stats of the game but that's how it goes sometimes, and then the defense gave up 85+ yards like Swiss cheese including a two-point conversion to allow Indiana to tie.
What in the wide wide world of sports happened to that defense that was so stout all day? Even though Ford scored I felt like the game was still won at that point because of how they had performed all day.
Ohio State (2), USC, MSU (2). Win those five games and they are elite... pretty simple. Terrible coaching in 4th quarter led to blown leads!
Feel free. If you have played or coached the position, you know it is nearly uncatchable given how poorly the ball was thrown.
Nope. That was 2014. We won 31-30 in 2015.https://www.espn.com/college-football/game/_/gameId/400763548
Yeah, he's mentioned it before that he was thinking about taking a TO rather than rush the FG kicker out there, but ended up rolling with it. A pretty curious decision since I believe OSU had two TOs left when he did it and the play clock was already winding down.
Of course, that's easy to say in retrospect. At the time he probably felt like he had plenty of time to set up the FG. Either way, whether rushed or not, that play resulted from a spectacular defensive play and return. An extraordinarily improbable sequence of events, but that's the beauty of the game.
Absolutely. As I have said before despite that mistake the defense had 4 separate chances to seal the victory and gaffed on all 4.
