Indianapolis Colts interim head coach Jeff Saturday went through some growing pains during Monday night’s loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers.
One of the topics of discussion pertained to Saturday’s refusal to use one of their three timeouts on a sequence of plays that burned roughly 30 seconds off the clock when they had less than a minute remaining.
After the game, Saturday told the media he didn’t think time was of the essence. He changed his tune Tuesday, acknowledging that he wish he would have used a timeout before it was essentially too late.
“I wish I had that third down back. In all honesty, I wish I would’ve used a timeout. Just looking at it on film – I looked at it last night again, looked at it this morning again,” Saturday said. “From a time perspective, I felt good but you could tell we were in disarray. I just didn’t have a great feel.”
It’s important for Saturday to acknowledge the situation. Now, we can move on from it without much issue. But it’s one of those aspects of coaching that only comes with experience.
There’s no telling whether the Colts would have scored a game-tying touchdown had Saturday used one of his timeouts correctly. But he at least had to give his team a chance, rather than backing themselves into a rushed third-down call that went for negative yards.
These learning experiences are going to happen for someone who hasn’t coached beyond the high school level. As long as he uses that as a learning experience, though, it could be beneficial.
“Parks (Frazier) made a great call. I still like the call. Right away, I told him to have one ready and as soon as he went down he had the call in place. His was on, but then we had the formation and personnel – we had guys running across,” Saturday said. “Again, looking back it’s a learning experience. I didn’t meet my expectations. Again, I hold the guys accountable, I’m accountable for that.”
The loss essentially knocked the Colts out of the playoff race and closer to a top-10 pick in the 2023 NFL draft. With one game ahead against the Dallas Cowboys before the bye week, Saturday will continue getting his team ready while learning from these moments.
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