Now I'm no body language expert, but Spaz had the look of a man defeated following BC's 24-19 loss to Florida State. Here is video of his postgame comments, which is pretty painful to watch.
Here's are the quotes from Spaziani, transcribed to the best of my ability. Some responses were fairly garbled.
"They've got a good football team. They're well coached. They did a good job. They made the plays when they had to. They earned the victory. Certainly was a hard fought game."
On challenging the spot at the end ...
"Well, I thought on the sideline that he didn't make it. I thought they gave him a generous spot. Digested with the time left. It was worth a chance. We also lost 15 seconds when they started the clock after that. The clock shouldn't have started until the snap ...
Two minutes or something left ... One timeout left ..."
On Florida State giving the Eagles a chance to win ...
"I think our guys played hard. Everybody. You see some of the things that I see ... they certainly played hard. We had a good defensive game plan. However, we didn't get it done. So ... Win as a team. Lose as a team."
On the play of Chase Rettig ...
"He played like a freshman. There were some mistakes in there. He played like a freshman. He did some nice things and he did some freshman things."
On the frustrations of popping two long runs only to settle for field goals ...
"Well we had four field goals, right? And you gotta get a touchdown. You gotta get touchdowns. We weren't able to pound it. Weren't able to get it in and we haven't scored a touchdown in a while and that needs to be corrected. Gotta move forward. Gotta get better."
On the decision not to go for the two-point conversion down 17-15 in the third quarter ...
"That was about 3 minutes to go in the third quarter. We had talked about when we would go for 2 and the thought was ... if was in the third quarter somewhere like that situation, we wouldn't. If it was later on, we would. It was just a decision to make at that time. There was plenty of time left."
On Montel Harris' performance ...
"Surprised everybody. Montel is a very good running back. We were able to get him some room to run. He missed some cuts and then later on ... I don't have the halftime stats so I'm not sure what he rushed for in the second half. I don't think we rushed as well in the second half as we did. And probably, once again, I didn't look ... but you figure two home runs.
That's good but you like to run the ball. Running the ball and two home runs is different."
This isn't the first time someone has written something similar, but Spaz is a terrible quote machine and his body language -- the awkward pauses and the fidgeting -- is all sorts of awful. Spaz's postgame comments inspires pretty much no one on the team and no one associated with the program.
I know the offense struggled to move the ball and it's tough to lose a game the way Boston College did (taking a lead into the fourth quarter ... on the road ... against a Top 25 outfit), but he has got to pull it together and appear more confident in these postgame interviews. If Spaz doesn't pull it together, this team and this season could quickly get away from him and spiral out of control.
There is still half a season to go, against a slate of opponents who have been playing football every bit as poorly as BC. The Eagles' ACC title hopes are all but over, but there is still a lot to play for. At least, in my opinion, there is.
A trip to the postseason -- the program's 12th straight -- still should be a goal for this team. A bowl appearance would give the Eagles an extra month of practice and the chance to further develop Chase Rettig heading into the 2011 season (very important, considering a similar opportunity was wasted at the beginning of this season). It would also give this BC senior class, guys like Herzlich, Albright, Davis, Gause, Castonzo, Claiborne and Lapham, a well-deserved curtain call.
Maybe none of that matters at this point. Maybe this is just video proof of a head coach totally and utterly defeated, and we'll all watch this season quickly spiral out of control.
Hat Tip: SouthernPigskin.com via ATL Eagle's Twitter account.