I was home for just a few minutes this morning before driving to the 49ers’ practice facility. But it was long enough to shower and watch the final minute of the game again.
The thing that stood out was how Shaun Hill handled himself. While everybody around him on the field – and on the sideline – was panicking, Hill was about the only person thinking clearly.
As I was driving to
But what you could not tell from TV is that there was mass confusion. The 49ers’ short-yardage offense started to come out on the field. Mike Martz was yelling to spike the ball. Then, it appeared as if he looked at the clock and changed his mind. At one point, the 49ers had probably 15 offensive players on the field.
Hill had to wait until the all the guys who were at first ordered onto the field went back to the sideline. Then, he had to make sure Jason Hill was lined up properly to avoid a penalty and a 10-second runoff on the clock.
There were a lot of things that went wrong in the final minute, but Hill did an outstanding job of keeping order.
It was because of lack of organization from Martz and the sideline that 25 seconds ran off the clock from the time Jason Hill was tackled at the 1-yard line to the time Shaun Hill restored order and spiked the ball.
Instead of getting a potential of four plays from the 1-yard line, the 49ers were able to run – and run they did – only two plays.
That’s where the game was lost.
