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ADVENTURES IN WTF: How Could You Possibly Screw Up Clock Management This Badly?

...AGAIN!

By Grant Salzano
Joshua S. Kelly-USA TODAY Sports

Listen, guys. I love Steve Addazio. I love him a whole lot. He seems like a great man. He gets the most out of his players. You may dislike his run-first philosophy, but I don't mind it. It can be successful and it can be exciting.

But as much as I love and support Steve Addazio, he truly does not have a hint of a clue how to manage the clock at the end of a half.

Let's go step by step and see how he screwed up almost every single play at the end of the 1st half.

BC gets the turnover on Clemson's side of midfield with 1:17 left and all three timeouts. With 1st downs stopping the clock, if you have any success whatsoever moving the ball, you should not need any more time than this.

Daz tries for some trickery on first down. Okay! I like the aggressiveness. No dice on positive yardage, but good idea. Okay!

We manage to get back almost to the original line of scrimmage, so all is not lost. Remember, even with our terrible kicking game, you only need 10 or 20 yards to at least take a shot at 3 points.

Instead...the clock ticks, and ticks, and ticks, and ticks, until there are FORTY SECONDS left on the clock! Thirty-seven seconds between plays!

YOU HAVE THREE TIMEOUTS NOW WOULD BE A GOOD TIME FOR ONE THERE IS LIKE A MINUTE LEFT

Fine. Okay. You're saving them for later I guess. Figure you'll run the ball a lot on the drive, okay, fine, I guess.

Next play, Smith is flushed out and he manages to throw the ball away. Third and long, but the clock stops, so I mean, you don't really have much of a decision to make here.

NOW YOU CALL TIMEOUT??

WHAT ARE YOU DOING??

I LITERALLY DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU ARE DOING.

The clock already stopped on this play for the incomplete pass. You are either going to not convert the third down in which case Clemson is going to have 30 seconds left on the clock regardless, or you're going to convert the third down and wish you weren't a frigging blockhead who burned two timeouts on the same play in which the clock had already stopped.

YOU COMPLETE BLOCKHEAD

IT WOULD HAVE BEEN USEFUL TO HAVE TWO ADDITIONAL TIMEOUTS HERE

At this point you are thinking "wow, we had three timeouts and 1:17 to play, we just ran 5 plays, one of which was a spike, so we should probably have like two timeouts and almost a minute left with first and goal" but NOPE one timeout 21 seconds, what the CHRIST.

Alright. 21 seconds and a timeout, first and goal. You can EASILY get three shots at the endzone here.

Show me the money, Daz.

You have got to be kidding me.

GREAT run play. Great! 2nd and goal at the 2 and a half yard line! Let's call that timeout we somehow didn't manage to burn, give ourselves fifteen seconds to take a couple of those easy fullback passes or QB rollouts with Smith to punch it in for 7.

BUT NO!

Not only does Addazio wait until it's too late to call timeout to take a shot at the endzone, he doesn't wait long enough to make the field goal the last play of the 2nd half and Clemson gets a chance to return a kickoff that could have ended in disaster.

How could you possibly screw that up so badly? I literally do not understand. Help me understand, Daz, because I love you, man, and you're breaking my heart.

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