During Sunday’s playoff game between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Detroit Lions, Buccaneers head coach Todd Bowles took a lot of heat for his decision not to call a timeout late in the game which would have forced Dan Campbell into a decision about whether to try a 49-yard field goal or punt. But Campbell doesn’t think the Lions should have allowed that to be a decision anyway.
After the game, Dan Campbell admitted that the team should have done a better job of taking time off of the clock instead of snapping the ball with time left on the play clock.
“First of all, we didn’t handle that whole thing well on our end,” Campbell said after the game according to Pro Football Talk. “We should have bled it more than we did. Look, I’ll be the first to admit that, and that’s on me. But yeah, we knew he had a timeout left. I could tell he wasn’t going to call it. That’s how it ended.”
Obviously, the mistake didn’t cost them too much as the Lions were still able to come away with a 31-23 over the Buccaneers to advance to the NFC championship game. But if the Lions want to make it to the Super Bowl or potentially win the championship, they’re going to have to be better at clock management going forward.
And it sounds like Campbell is committed to making sure that happens.
