[mary]

Originally Posted by Murphy3

Here's the thinking Mary.. UT believed that they had a better chance of having a FG blocked and returned for a TD than having OSU drive the length of the field and score a TD with only a half minute to play with no timeouts.

What's the right answer? Well, I don't know what the odds are for a team to drive 99 yards in half a minute with no timeouts. I don't know that the scenario comes up very often. I also don't know what the percentage of FG's from that close getting blocked and returned for TD's is...

Another thing is this. They might have also worried a bit about OSU returning a kick off for a TD if they were to kick the FG and make it. Now, that would be a secondary issue and not something that should be at the forefront of the thought process.

But basically, I don't know which answer was the right one. The odds are so miniscule either way you slice it for OSU.. drive 99.5 yards with 30 seconds and no TO's down by 4 if UT doesn't score the TD.. or, score after the kickoff if UT does kick the FG.

UT scoring from half a yard out in that situation has probably got to be about a 70-85% proposition... So, I can't fault them for what they did at all. OSU driving down the field with 30 seconds left (and no TO's) after stopping UT can't be more than like a 1%-2% chance at best... so the odds were enormously stacked against them... You're probably talking about percentage chances WAY less than 1% for OSU.

I suppose you have to factor in the chances that McCoy throws an interception or fumbles the ball in that situation on 4th down. But, with as smart as he is and as talented as he is AND with the orders to just throw the ball away if nothing is there.. those odds are rather miniscule as well. His average pass probably only has about a 1 in 60 chance of being intercepted on a normal play. But in that situation, I'd probably have to say that the odds of him throwing an interception are closer to 1 in 200 or so.

And yeah, of course.. like with most stats, I'm making up the majority of them on the fly. But, I think they at least give you an indication at how unlikley it was that something would go wrong for UT when deciding to go for it. Honestly, just about the worse case scenario for them was for OSU to somehow stop UT on the 4th down play (which they hadn't really stopped UT all day), and for them to drive far enough to get in a situation to where they could throw a hail Mary into the end zone.. The odds of that even happening were heavily stacked against OSU. They didn't get into a situation to where they could do so, but they almost did.. came about 4-5 yards short.

Thanks Murph, that was a great explanation.

Well, I don't know what the odds are for a team to drive 99 yards in half a minute with no timeouts. I don't know that the scenario comes up very often. I also don't know what the percentage of FG's from that close getting blocked and returned for TD's is...

Given that the two events were both unlikely, I didn't think that the chances of a blocked FG were so great that it was worth sacrificing an almost certain 3 points, and putting the team ahead by a full score. This, of course, was MB's explanation in his post-game interview.

They might have also worried a bit about OSU returning a kick off for a TD if they were to kick the FG and make it. Now, that would be a secondary issue and not something that should be at the forefront of the thought process.

A concern over kick-off coverage makes more sense to me than being worried about blocked FG's being returned for touchdowns (which I figured was almost as unlikely as McCoy throwing an interception and it being run back for a touchdown).