Jeff Saturday defends clock administration at finish of Colts’ loss

INDIANAPOLIS — Colts interim coach Jeff Saturday defended his clock administration within the last minutes of Monday night time’s loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers, saying he determined towards taking a timeout till 30 seconds remained as a result of he “did not really feel like time was actually of the essence at that second.”

The Colts, trailing by seven, had been in a little bit of a frantic scenario, dealing with fourth-and-3 from the Pittsburgh 37-yard line on the 2-minute warning. After changing, Indianapolis quarterback Matt Ryan was sacked for a 7-yard loss on first down, then scrambled for 14 yards on second down.

The second-down play was snapped with 59 seconds remaining, however the Colts elected to not name a timeout regardless of possessing all three of their timeouts. They as an alternative used a gradual method, snapping the ball late into the play clock after which handing the ball to operating again Jonathan Taylor, who was stopped for no achieve on a third-and-3. The Colts lastly referred to as timeout after the Taylor run, with 30 seconds left.

With Saturday and play caller Parks Frazier working simply their third sport of their new roles, it could possibly be argued the Colts would have benefited from a reset in that scenario, however Saturday mentioned the employees already had the run play dialed up and appreciated its probabilities of success.

“I believed we had play,” he mentioned. “And I felt like we might get it. Clearly, we did not do a fantastic job [blocking] on the bottom, so it is worse. However I felt good in regards to the name earlier than. Felt like we had time, we might have timeouts afterwards. We had been in hanging distance. So, I by no means felt just like the stress of needing the timeout.

“We simply did not execute it.”

Saturday appeared to counsel the Colts snapped the ball later than he desired on the third-down play, saying, “Would I’ve appreciated [Ryan] to snap it somewhat bit earlier? Positive. However, once more, by no means felt pressed for time.”

It is unclear whether or not there was a miscommunication between the employees and Ryan.

On fourth down, the Colts tried a throw to well-covered Parris Campbell that was incomplete. The Steelers took over on downs and ran out the clock to protect a 24-17 win.

The Colts (4-7-1) are 1-2 since Saturday took the helm after Frank Reich’s firing final month.