USC Timeouts at End of 1st Half

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BilldGopher

BilldGopher

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Okay...I don't claim to be the greatest on X's and O's on a chalkboard but I'd like to hear theories on what happened with the three USC timeouts at the end of the first half. My recollection is the Gophers took a knee on offense with about a 1:10 or so left on the clock. Then begins the USC series of TOs during the Gopher possession...with plays for three small gains (I think) followed by a punt...which in the end has USC with 4 seconds left and then they take a knee.

What gives?

I myself just figured it was Kiffen working us as fans. The boos had already come down on the Gophers "knee play." Taking the TOs only forced us to play on...which only reinforced the fans' unhappiness.

What am I missing? Or is it really just a simple means to mess with the opponents 12th Man?

Go Gophers! Beat Northern Illinois!
 

The fans around me were booing the Gophers decision to take a knee, and cheering USC for forcing us to make a play.

If you think about it at all, it was just smart coaching by Kiffin. Ending the first half with timeouts in your pocket is worthless, and he knew he would at least get a chance to return a punt from a VERY shaky punter.
 

The only reason Kiffin did it was to take a crack at blocking the punt. He clearly thinks he's playing NCAA Football 2011 instead of coaching an actual game.
 

GophBen said:
The only reason Kiffin did it was to take a crack at blocking the punt. He clearly thinks he's playing NCAA Football 2011 instead of coaching an actual game.
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That and I think he wanted the fans to turn on Brewster and the team which they did.....they played into Kiffin's hands perfectly....
 

I think he just did it to play mind games. The Gopher fans booing and he took advantage of it and him being from Minnesota didn't hurt any. I thought it was kind of funny actually.

He didn't really seem to want any points out of it since Barkley just took a knee anyways.
 


Smart football, they nearly blocked the punt. Unlike us, he wanted to give his squad another chance to score.
 

I admit I thought it was odd that he burned the timeouts only to get the ball and take a knee. With 4 seconds left I was expecting a hail mary of some sort.
 

He wanted a chance to try to block the punt or have us make a stupid mistake like fumbling or something.
 

Westside Bloomington's Most Wanted just wanted another illustration of why he is the biggest d0uche to walk the sidelines.
 



Psychology...

Accepting the proposition that Kiffin was looking for an error to be forced...pretty poor spot for the HC to find himself.

He could order take a knee each time and bring on the wrath of the fans once again...or...

Do as the team did and run the plays...

Given the choices, probably better to run a play the first time instead of the knee. At least there's one more chance for a gain in the mix.

That entire situation probably works a number on the QB too. Yuk.

Go Gophers! Beat the Huskies!
 

If you're Kiffin, why not take them? The Gophs weren't going to burn you for it, so you might as well force a punt to either let Johnson return it or try for the block.
 


SonOfTheVarsity said:
If you're Kiffin, why not take them? The Gophs weren't going to burn you for it, so you might as well force a punt to either let Johnson return it or try for the block.
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I agree, it doesn't do you much good to have the timeouts unused.
 




I thought Kiffin had a rough day coaching. I think it was smart for him to use those timeouts at the end but why didn't he use one when the Gophers were running the play clock about fifty seconds earlier...? Also, I thought Weber fumbled and there was a decent chance of an overturn and he just screamed at the side judge for not reviewing, as if the side judge can do anything. And I'm not sure he's set a trend yet in the two-point conversion plays.
 


It teaches his players to keep playing until the game is over among other things.
 

It was the right thing to do as a coach, but the most annoying thing to do for fans.
 

CentralGopher said:
It teaches his players to keep playing until the game is over among other things.
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This makes absolutely positively zero sense. Brew wasn't giving up - the gameplan was to shorten the game against a better team. Your QB had just thrown the worst pass in 5 years.

Heaving the ball downfield in the hopes of somehow getting into field goal range for a kicker that would miss the kick even if you got there should be taught in the class entitled "How to Not Play the Percentages 101."
 

we have no history of us making stupid mistakes

Ski U Master said:
He wanted a chance to try to block the punt or have us make a stupid mistake like fumbling or something.
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it was good coaching - forced us to handle the ball on a punt - they knew we could not make a first down running the ball
 

It forced us to punt, that's an opportunity. You could get a blocked kick or a long return. The only risk was a muffed punt.
 

RodentRampage said:
It forced us to punt, that's an opportunity. You could get a blocked kick or a long return. The only risk was a muffed punt.
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Not totally unlikely given how poorly their return man fielded punts on Sat.
 

josh087 said:
This makes absolutely positively zero sense. Brew wasn't giving up - the gameplan was to shorten the game against a better team. Your QB had just thrown the worst pass in 5 years.

Heaving the ball downfield in the hopes of somehow getting into field goal range for a kicker that would miss the kick even if you got there should be taught in the class entitled "How to Not Play the Percentages 101."
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Actually it does make sense. It may not have been what he intended but look at how many USC players were leaving the field before the half was actually over. After Kiffin called the timeouts they had to come back and learned that no matter what they have to play until the game or half in this case is actually over. It would have been much easier to just let us take a knee and go in for the half but Kiffin forced his players to keep playing for additional time.
 

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