Penn State’s Matt Campbell Says Decisions vs. Wisconsin Have Gone Through His Head ‘A Million Times’

So, you think you’ve been second-guessing some of the decisions Matt Campbell made on Saturday night in Beaver Stadium? Join the crowd — it’s a big one.

And it includes Campbell himself. The first-year Penn State head coach said on Tuesday that the Nittany Lions’ Homecoming collapse against Wisconsin has turned into a come-to-Jesus moment for him. Many times over.

“It’s like every decision in last Saturday night’s game has gone through your head a million times of how could you be better from that standpoint?” Campbell shared during his weekly press conference in Beaver Stadium.

A number of times, and a number of ways on Tuesday, Campbell was asked about — and he answered — how the Nittany Lions’ 17-0 second-quarter lead turned into a 24-20 defeat, after the Badgers scored on a 72-yard touchdown play with 73 seconds left in the game.

Often, Campbell used numbers to share how large the game has weighed on his mind. And also to explain his decision-making process. Here’s a recap:

50/50 ON FOURTH-AND–1 — The situation: End of the third quarter, PSU ahead 20-10. Campbell let the clock expire…then began the final quarter with the Lions first lined up on offense…then called timeout…then they punted.

Campbell explains: “I think the [plan] coming out of the TV timeout is to go for it, honestly. And I think we had a play call. We knew, kind of, what we were going to do. I kind of saw what their alignment was, and that was for me, I’m just like, ‘I don’t think we have the advantage here.’ I think I was 50/50 on going for it, anyways. And I think when I saw what they came out [in] defensively, I didn’t want to try to draw them offsides because I didn’t want to have a situation where we could go offsides. …It’s why I ended up taking the timeout there and punting the football away rather than either taking the five-yard penalty before trying to draw them offsides.”

IGNORE THE NUMBERS — The situation: On that fourth-and-1, math and probabilities and statistics said go for it. Campbell’s gut said otherwise.

Campbell explains: “Again, I think that’s where analytics goes out the window. Analytics is going to tell you to go for it. That’s what it’s going to say. We know that. I know what the analytics said. Honestly, there was conversation with D’Anton [Lynn] and Mouse [Taylor Mouser] a little bit about how do you feel, what do you feel? But at the end of the day, it comes back on me to make the decision. I think there’s been plenty of times where we have gone for that. …I just felt like situationally, I didn’t feel like it was the right time and the right place to maybe panic and give them a short field and feel like they could have more time to get themselves back into the football game.”

48 HOURS OF ANGST — The situation: That fourth-and-1. Again. Play conservative football offensively, and leading what looked to be comfortably, 20-10, put the pressure on the Badgers for the final quarter. Campbell thought about that decision the past couple of days.

Campbell explains: “We made the decision coming out of the half to [try to] have them play offensive football in the student section in the fourth quarter, and I just felt like that was really the decision-making piece of it. I really didn’t want to screw it up. And again, I think you can debate the heck out of it because I have to be honest with you for the last 48 hours. But I still feel like with the flow of the game, what was going on, that’s really why I kind of thought, you know what, we’re not going to screw around here.”

1 WIDE RECEIVER CAUGHT A PASS — The situation: One and only one wide receiver. That WR would be Chase Sowell, who had six receptions for 70 yards, as star wide receiver Koby Howard was out with an injury.

Campbell explains: “…we have to do better. It has to start with myself, us as coaches. How do we give ourselves a better opportunity, better flow in the football game? Offensively, we just couldn’t find a flow in the game. Part of that was how could we distribute the football better? How could we create more space? I think all those things are real conversations that we continue to have.”

4 RUNNING BACKS — The situation: Many running backs, not a featured back. Pick one. (Not Hansen.)

Campbell explains: “I’ll be honest with you, I think we’re trying to find somebody to grab a stranglehold of this and kind of be the front-runner… we need somebody to separate, to be the bell cow, in some of these critical moments. We’re looking for that. Those are the honest discussions behind closed doors. I think the positive is, all those guys we believe in. The reality of it is, we’d love to see somebody emerge in that room.”

3 RUNS ON 3 THIRD-AND-LONGS — The situation: Campbell turtled and opted to run the ball rather than pass and try for a first down on three crucial drives, when PSU was facing a third-and-12, a third-and-12 and a third-and-13. All three runs failed to pick up a first down; two led to punts and the third a field goal.

Campbell explains: “I think a little bit of the football game, you’re playing with such a lead early on that you don’t want to screw it up. And you’re playing such great defense and you’re putting yourself in such a great situation that you felt like the flow of the game, the turnovers, you just wanted to keep playing field position a little bit and continue to put yourself in a great situation. Again, I go back to what’s the head coach’s responsibility? The flow of the game. It’s like, man, I don’t know if I did a good enough job as the head football coach conducting the flow of the game at times.

“We got into a good lead and then I think you were kind of like, man, let’s keep playing field position. I think maybe some of that came back to bite us at the end of the football game. By no means do I feel good about how we maybe played the second half of the football game from tempo, from how we attacked it, and I think some great learning lessons for all of us moving forward.”