His decision will be dissected and disparaged in Wisconsin as long as Vince Lombardi remains en vogue.
At the most critical juncture of his coaching career, Matt LaFleur froze like tundra, Green Bay fans will insist. The second-year Packers coach’s epitaph might some day include his decision to try a field goal on fourth-and-goal from the 8 with the Packers trailing the Bucs by eight with barely more than two minutes to play Sunday.
“Yeah, any time it doesn’t work out, you always regret it, right?” LaFleur said.
“So the way I was looking at it was, we essentially had four timeouts with the two-minute warning and we knew we needed to get a stop. ... We’re always going to be process-driven here, and the way our defense was battling, the way our defense was playing, we felt like it was the right decision to do.”
Yet in the process of endorsing his own defense, LaFleur might indirectly have made a glowing testament to Tampa Bay’s. In lieu of giving likely league MVP Aaron Rodgers another shot at the end zone, he took three meaningless points.
“That wasn’t my decision,” Rodgers said.
But it may have been the ultimate compliment to defensive coordinator Todd Bowles’ unit, which sacked Rodgers five times (three by outside linebacker Shaquil Barrett) and intercepted him once in Sunday’s 31-26 triumph in the NFC title game.
“I can’t say enough about them,” Bucs coach Bruce Arians said.
“They’ve been great in the fourth quarter all year, and we got some great stops. Took a couple of chances on offense and tried to get more points and it didn’t work out, but they came back and got the ball right back for us.”
For all its hiccups during this 19-game grind, Bowles’ unit has calcified the last two weeks to a hardness reminiscent of the Bucs’ last Super Bowl-qualifying defense. A week after intercepting Drew Brees three times, the Bucs flustered Rodgers and Co. on a frigid day (29 degrees at kickoff) before arguably its most raucous road crowd of the season.
The Packers managed 5.5 yards per play, nearly a yard shy of their season average (6.3); and their previously daunting run game had only 67 yards — a yard shy of their season low. Perhaps most important, the Bucs forced them into three-and-outs following each of Tom Brady’s two fourth-quarter interceptions, essentially preserving the outcome.
This despite starting free safety Antoine Winfield Jr. (ankle) missing the game and strong safety Jordan Whitehead being sidelined earlier in the game by a shoulder injury.
“It tells you something special about this defense,” said veteran outside linebacker Jason Pierre-Paul, who had two sacks.
“We closed the game out, Tom (Brady) closed the game out and that was it. Don’t get me wrong, Aaron Rodgers is a great quarterback, a phenomenal quarterback. ... The defense just showed up like we showed up last year, this year and the whole year.”
