Mike Macdonald: "Geno Smith Played A Dynamite Game"

Mike Macdonald (0:00)

All right, we got everybody. Man, it was a, what a heck of a football game.

We knew the game was going to come down to the fourth quarter. Didn't expect to come down to the fifth quarter, but whatever it takes. Just proud, I mean, again, just same, and just proud of the fight, the resiliency, just the confidence, the support, the togetherness of our football team. So that's a good, really good football team. We just played tough. Obviously, they ran the ball really well. They stopped the run, but our guys came through in the end, and then just proud of our guys. We need to make a play. It seems like on all three phases, the guys made plays without inventing techniques or whatever. Just kind of played through the scheme, played through their fundamentals, and we closed it out at the end. So just a great football game, and excited to get back home.

SPEAKER_2 (0:54)

You had a bunch of drops and not a lot of help from the run game, but Geno got it done. What did he show you today?

Mike Macdonald (1:00)

Man, I thought Geno played a dynamite game. I thought he was decisive, the ball was out fast. I thought we had a great plan. Yeah, we had a couple of drops, but we'll clean those up. I mean, I'm not sure what the numbers are, but they're probably pretty dang good.

SPEAKER_3 (1:15)

He had a bunch of game winning drives last season, had the game tied in when he drive today.

SPEAKER_4 (1:19)

What does that say about his voice?

Mike Macdonald (1:20)

Sounds like that's who he is. So, you know, let the tape speak for itself, and I'm glad he's on our side.

SPEAKER_3 (1:28)

What did you, Julian's blocked field goal, was that an inside play or just him something he was able to figure out there?

Mike Macdonald (1:34)

No, they don't just like invent, yeah. I mean, that was the play, that's the field goal rush at that time without getting into like the strategy involved, but he made a heck of a play. I mean, just heck of a play, but it's something you practice all the time and finally when you have the opportunity, you know, he goes and executes it, so yes, that was big time. You know, it's part of the. Oh, go ahead.

SPEAKER_4 (1:56)

William dropped it up on last week and then this week caught one where he was hit. How big was that?

Mike Macdonald (2:01)

Oh, yeah, he played a dynamite game. He played a great, he did a great job. He told you he had confidence in him. He had such had, he said such a great off season, but we had a big return in the first half, caught the ball there. I don't know who got blocked into him, but but that was, I mean, he's going to have to make those plays moving forward, but he's the man for the job.

SPEAKER_3 (2:19)

Mike, with all that happened, how dependable is Clutch's time?

Mike Macdonald (2:22)

He looked good today, Greg.

SPEAKER_2 (2:27)

He gets one or two targets for 60 minutes and the game's on the line.

Mike Macdonald (2:30)

He just has a, it's just, that's him. You know, I mean, you knew it coming in, you knew his reputation.

Learning who he is as a person who we absolutely, absolutely love, but that there's something special about him where he comes alive in those clutch moments, man. It's, again, I mean, it's just, I just, we love him, but it means just a great job by Tyler. What do you see on that third down, sopping over Hove? Well, I felt the rush. I didn't know who it was at the time, but I think Derek Hall had a really good rush. And, you know, they did some good things on offense in the first half on third down, so we had to make a couple of adjustments. You know, they're hitting the tight ends. So we had to adjust a little bit of our rush play, but this is what happens to the NFL. Like, teams are going to have good plans. You're going to have to kind of understand how they're attacking you and then kind of move and shake from there. So the guys did a great job of kind of going to the next things and playing some of the plays that they were running against us. And I thought our rush started to come alive in the second half. Would have been great to get them on the ground more. But, you know, Jacoby, he's a really good player, too. You know, he understands that. I told you he was elusive. And he got rid of the ball in some of those critical situations.