“You always second-guess those things; you can always second-guess those motives. You can always go back and look at it and see if you can get it snapped a little bit quicker.”
By the time the next play had been completed — an incomplete pass to Mooney — 23 seconds had passed, leaving Atlanta with 17 seconds remaining.
On the first play of their final drive, beginning with 40 seconds left, Penix immediately put the Falcons in business by nailing Darnell Mooney down the right sideline for 25 yards.
Morris is in his first year as head coach after being given the head coaching job over now-North Carolina Tar Heels coach Bill Belichick in the offseason.
“In hindsight, it could have been a good decision or a better decision to take that timeout, but I wanted to have the opportunity to move up there,” Morris said, according to ESPN.com.
Mooney was tackled in bounds, and the Atlanta offense, which still had two timeouts, began frantically running to the line of scrimmage to get a play off as precious seconds ticked off the clock.
With a win, the Falcons would have kept control of their own destiny for the playoffs.