Green Bay Packers Coach Mike McCarthy blames failure to do basics as cause of playoff defeat - NFL News
Green Bay Packers' season ended after their surprising 37-20 defeat to New York Giants in the divisional round playoff game, and its coach, Mike McCarthy spent his final press conference on Wednesday looking into the weaknesses of his team that led to their
unexpected exit.
McCarthy said that his team failed to do the basics correctly and the simplest of their mistakes led to the loss.
“It’s uncharacteristic of our football team, it’s uncharacteristic of our football team in the past. We weren’t good enough in areas of fundamentals to win on Sunday.”
Packers' defence has been woeful throughout the season but the team’s offence led by quarterback, Aaron Rodgers, was more than enough to offset their weaknesses for majority of the season.
However, against the Giants, the offence had an off day and for just the second time in 2011, failed to outscore their opponents.
Giants' defence harassed and harried Packers a lot and never let Rodgers get comfortable with the game.
The wonderful defensive performance led Packers to turnover the ball four times as Rodgers completed just 56.5% of his passes, and even threw a rare interception.
Once more the defence failed to put in the tackles or stop Eli Manning from passing with impunity to his wide receivers and with Packers' offence not there to bail them out this time, Giants took home a famous victory, progressing to the National Football
Conference (NFC) Championship round.
McCarthy however, believes that the team will return better than ever in the new regular season, and, with some good additions from the draft, make further progress in the postseason.
"Our football team will improve," McCarthy said.
"I believe in what our coaching staff gives us during the offseason program. History reflects that, and we will be adding another significant draft class to this football team. So as far as free agency, veteran free agency and all of that, those are really
hypothetical situations. I'm sure it's fun for everybody to play GM. But we'll go through the process like we always do."
Packers lost just once in the regular season as they ended with a wonderful 15-1 record, qualifying for the postseason as NFC North Division Champions with a first week bye and home field advantage.
Aaron Rodgers and Packers' offence were virtually unstoppable as Packers' juggernaut rolled over every opponent.
However, when push came to shove the Packers were found wanting and their failure to progress to the Championship game being the hot favourites was one of the most shocking results of the season.
Green Bay Packers would now look to sign players who will be entering free agency as their contract run out, and they would also have to wait and see if some of their coaching staff would stay or move on to new opportunities.
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