Mississippi State Bulldogs

Dan Mullen: use your timeouts!

Published Jun. 30, 2017 6:28 p.m. ET

foxsports

No coach likes to take his timeouts home like Dan Mullen does.

There were so many things wrong in Mississippi State’s 40-38 loss to Kentucky that picking out just the timeouts seems pretty silly. But I really don’t feel like digging into it right now.

Not the horrible run defense, the dreadful passing offense or anything else. I’ll just gripe about Coach Mullen not ‘freezing the kicker’ for now.

How do you not do this?

Up one, with two timeouts in his pocket and Kentucky’s field goal kicker set to attempt a 51 yarder, Mullen elected not to have the kicker think about it. Surely enough, he drills it through the uprights as time expires to win the game.

If you call the timeout to freeze the kicker but he still makes it then you did what you could in that situation and that’s all there is to it. But when you don’t call the timeout when you had one to call, that’s just stupid.

It’s so easy to second guess a call like this because nearly every coach in that situation – be it college or pro – will call a timeout.

Just last week Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney called a timeout before a chip-shot field goal attempt by N.C. State…..and it worked. Eventually, Clemson won the game in overtime. Freezing the kicker allowed them to stay undefeated and in the thick of the College Football Playoff race.

The stakes for MSU weren’t nearly as high, but you do everything you can to win. And not calling a timeout in that situation is lazy and irresponsible.

This isn’t an issue that is isolated to this one game. Time and time again Mullen struggles to use his timeouts, and will walk off the field with them in his pocket.

The game wasn’t much fun to watch. The Bulldogs were out-gained 554 yards to 362, yet somehow were in a position to win at the end. Instead, Mullen wouldn’t even attempt to freeze Kentucky’s kicker on an field goal try that was anything but routine in the college game.