The straight scoop from
Colonel Mustard
Jan. 4, 1999
This loss has hit me hard, but I feel the worst for Frank. This was his chance to get everybody off his back for the winter. I already have friends telling me that this guy can't coach. It is more of the casual fan than the intense fan, but this is the kind of talk that would not have happened if we had won.
What's toughest to take is that we just can't run the ball. And our play-calling was without rhythm. We tried to pass on first down which was a good idea, but Crouch missed the open throws. But he also made a lot of good throws and ran tough. He is a great athlete and will become a better passer with experience. We can't get down on him. He missed a chance by not having a great game of taking over the position. But we went away from the option way too quick. We had some sucess and then we quit trying. Wiggins' fumble was awful and cost us the early momentum. As I said last week, using Christo was a poor coaching choice. He is a turnover waiting to happen and we don't owe him a chance. In a game this close, we can't afford to miss a series.
The defense played its best game of the year by far. If they had played like that all year, we would have won two more games. Rucker was incredible, and the only reason they started moving the ball on us was that our defense wore down because we could't keep the ball.
Evans was no factor because Gillespie said he didn't fit into the flow of the game, whatever that means. I think Gillespie is a dope. We weren't moving the ball and our best running back didn't fit into the flow of the game? That was the problem -- the game had no offensive flow.
Frank's our guy, and he will be better next year. I hope he will be luckier as well. In three of our four losses we led in the fourth quarter and
lost it. We had a last drive in each game and failed each time. You would think that out of those six chances, our defense or offense would have come through.
-- The Colonel