Just to refresh you, he was the head football coach at Arkansas (a prime job). He is married, has children and was having an affair with a 25 year old hottie on his staff. He got in a motorcycle accident with her and lied about it. Because of all that he got his sorry ass summarily fired.
Lately he has popped up as the head coach of Western Kentucky U. which was playing in the Little Caesar’s Bowl tonight. It was a fun game to watch. A lot of great back and forth action, trading leads and unconventional plays, situations and call. Good stuff!
So, late in the game WKU is down by 3 and well inside the CMU 30 yard line. It’s 4th and 2. WKU can kick a very makable field goal and take the game into overtime. So what does Petrino do, he goes for it and fails. Run the clock out, game over. A win for CMU.
The AD should fire this guy’s ass tomorrow. His judgement has not gotten any better since the motorcycle accident and only spells more trouble.
It’s hard to recall a worse call in football since the Lions coach decided on the coin toss to defend in sudden death overtime.
I don’t know what the odds are of winning if you make that 4th and 2, but if the alternative is a 45+ yard FG which leads to an overtime, I think that coach made the right call.
It was worse than I described it. WKU was on the CMU 19 yard line with a 4th & 2. That’s about a 36 yard field goal. Any HS kicker should make that 90% of the time.
I’ll allow you to modify your opinion but if you think that going for it was the right call then . . .
Yeah, especially since the quality of Kickers in college football is a lot more inconsistent than in the pros. Wouldn’t surprise me at all if Western Kentucky University had a Kicker who is not to be trusted with a FG of that length.
What would you say the chances are of WKU winning if the game goes to overtime? I think it’s reasonable to say it’s 50%; both teams were invited to the same bowl game, and played to a tie at the end of regulation. On this day, at least, they are evenly matched. So, in the situation in question, attempting the field goal gives you a 90% chance (making the field goal) at a 50% chance of winning the game. That’s 45%.
What’s your chance of winning if you go for it on fourth down? I don’t know; first you have to make those two yards, and then a lot of different things can happen. But it’s not out of the question to say their chances were better than 45%, in which case they made the right call.
The 4th down calculator at Advanced NFL Stats gives the win percentages as 37% for kicking a field goal, and 33% for going for it. Obviously that’s based on NFL stats and not college, so take it with a grain of salt. It’s close enough that the relative strengths of the specific teams in question can tip the decision either way.
Incidentally, changing it to 4th and 1 rather than 4th and 2 makes going for it the preferred option, at 40%. It seems to be a close decision.