Thank You for Not Coaching, aka “The Kirby Awards” – Week 0

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Back in 2013, then Grantland, now ESPN NFL writer Bill Barnwell wrote a column detailing terrible decisions made by coaches every Sunday during the NFL season. He titled the weekly article “Thank You for Not Coaching” and I loved those articles.

Barnwell doesn’t do those anymore now that he’s writing for ESPN rather than upstart Grantland, but the idea is great: point out the stupid things that coaches do every week that cost their team a game. The only thing is that I don’t just want to steal Barnwell’s name (even if I’m going to steal his idea), so I have to come up with a name.

And when we think about coaches who make decisions that absolutely kill their team, particularly in games that they should win or have leads in, there’s only one college coach and program who comes to mind.

Thus, let me introduce this weekly feature that looks at a game or two in college football and the coaching decisions that directly cost a team the game: The Kirby Award.

Nebraska vs. Illinois

Nebraska was favored by 6.5 points against the Illini. Scott Frost said he thought this was the best team he’s had at Nebraska in his time there. He had a fourth year starter in Adrian Martinez and his defense knocked out Illinois’ starting QB in the first quarter.

Yet, Nebraska fell to Illinois 30-22 in a game that wasn’t even remotely that close.

Pundits – and indeed Frost – will point to the two missed extra points and the safety given up on a poor decision to field a punt return deep in their own territory as the mistakes that cost Nebraska. In some ways that’s true, but that’s not what cost the Huskers the game.

No, the thing that cost Nebraska this game was the play calling.

Nebraska couldn’t run the ball at all in the first half (2.6 yards per rush on 18 attempts). After Illinois scored on a Martinez fumble and then opened up the second half with a time-consuming TD drive, Nebraska was going to open things up, right?

Well, aside from the 75-yard rush by Martinez that was actually a broken pass play, the Huskers rushed the ball 20 times for 39 yards (2.0 yards per rush). But look at that again: 20 rushes, compared to 18 passes in the second half.

On an 8-play drive at the end of the 3^rd quarter and beginning of the 4^th, Nebraska took 3:08 off the clock to move the ball 36 yards on a drive that consisted of 5 called passes and 3 runs. But that was dictated by an offensive pass interference call and a holding penalty that put the Huskers into passing situations.

You know how I know it’s true that Frost wasn’t going to deviate from his plan? After the offensive pass interference call put Nebraska at first-and-25, he ran the ball (for a one-yard loss). Nebraska was fortunate to complete a 28-yarder on the next play, but to just give up a down on first down is a conservative call that shows where his head was at.

This is even more true if you look at the touchdown drive that followed this one. That drive consisted of 19 plays for 91 yards and took 6:42 off the clock. The only problem is that when Nebraska got the ball, they were down by 14 and only had 9:15 on the clock.

Yet, Frost’s team had 12 rushes to only 7 passes on that drive. One of those “rushes” was on a bad snap that put Nebraska in a dire situation, but they also handed it off to Gabe Ervin or Rahmir Johnson, on purpose, seven times.

The Huskers had a first down at the Illinois 15 with 4:51 left in the game. They then proceeded to run the ball four of the next seven plays and scored with 2:41 left.

The Huskers got the ball back down 8 at their own 13 with only 48 seconds left and threw the ball six consecutive times: too little, too late.

Takeaway

Yes, the missed extra points, the punt return that turned into a safety, the bad snaps and the ill-timed penalties played a role in Nebraska’s demise.

But the reality is that the Huskers averaged 7.3 yards per pass attempt, just about the average for a QB. They got 111 yards rushing from Adrian Martinez, an average of 6.5 yards per attempt, which is on the high end of what you’re going to get from a QB.

The reason they lost the game was they only got 63 yards from their running backs, and that it took 21 carries to get there. But even more than that, the reason they lost the game is that Scott Frost insisted on relying on those runs even when it became clear that Nebraska was going to have to lean even harder into Adrian Martinez, whether he was consistent or not.

You can’t look at your first half stats, have run for 2.6 yards per carry and then double-down by running the ball 21 times compared to 12 pass attempts before desperation time. You can’t have a 7-minute drive with 9 minutes left when you’re down by 14.

Well, you can, but that’s how Will Muschamp ends up as a special teams coordinator at Georgia rather than the head coach at either Florida or South Carolina.

So congratulations to Scott Frost, the Week 0 winner of The Kirby Award.