With 1:05 to play on Sunday, Washington took a 17-13 lead in Detroit. Then the Lions executed a six-play, 75-yard drive to score the game-winning touchdown. Washington coach Jay Gruden says the defensive play calling deserves some of the blame.
Gruden said he would have liked to see more pressure on Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford, but instead Washington only rushed three and dropped eight into coverage.
“I think when you look back at the call you’d like to get more people around Matthew,” Gruden said, via Liz Clarke of the Washington Post. “He does a great job of buying time and then finding seams and holes in the zone. He almost threw a touchdown earlier, scrambling out to his right because we didn’t get a lot of pressure on him. But at that time we were playing against the clock obviously; we wanted to stop a check-down so we decided to drop eight.”
Two Washington defensive linemen, Ricky Jean Francois and Chris Baker, said after the game that they would have liked to see a better pass rush at the end of the game. Gruden said he understood where they were coming from.
“I think as a pass rusher, if you’re a defensive lineman, you don’t want to drop into coverage,” Gruden said. “I mean, I respect their problem with dropping into a hook instead of rushing the quarterback because they really get paid to rush the quarterback. They don’t get paid to backpedal.”
The final drive couldn’t have gone any worse for Washington’s defense. Gruden’s comments suggest that there will be some changes to their approach the next time they’re nursing a fourth quarter lead.
