The New Orleans Saints are in need of assistance for the playoffs, but they should concentrate on themselves as they head into their final two regular-season games.
The New Orleans Saints (7-8) will take a long weekend off before starting preparations for a division game against Tampa Bay (7-7) at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida, next week. Coach Dennis Allen stated on Friday that the team’s only option is to simply keep trying to control what it can because its chances of winning the NFC South Division and a postseason berth now depend on the actions of other teams.
The Buccaneers and New Orleans had the same record going into Thursday night’s 30-22 loss to the Rams at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California. The Saints will require outside help to pull into a tie over the weekend and then be back in position to move up into first place with a win the following Sunday (the Buccaneers play Jacksonville at home on Sunday).
After the game on Thursday, Allen said, “It was frustrating in that we didn’t play better than we did, but it’s the performance we put out there.” “Both of us must accept responsibility for that performance, after which we must go on and make the required adjustments.
“We’ve got two more division games (New Orleans will play the Falcons in the Caesars Superdome the weekend following their trip to Tampa). I have no idea where everything is going to stand by the time we get to the Tampa Bay game next week, but that’s what we control. We control how we get ready to go play that game, so that’s where our focus is going to be.
“Next week, our guys will get here prepared to work. We’ll devise a strategy to defeat Tampa Bay, but we still need to go down there, carry it out, and finish the job. And we have control over that. Our attention will be on our actions as we have control over them and cannot control what occurs with any other team.”
Complete dominance was lost against the Rams, as New Orleans finished with 339 yards overall and only 35 yards running (on 16 carries), one turnover, and three missed fourth-down conversions en route to a 30-7 loss.
“We just weren’t consistent enough in any phase of the game to give ourselves a real chance in the game,” Allen said. “I just felt like there were some things we did offensively where we moved the ball, and yet, we stalled out on third down once we got across midfield.
“We went in with a little bit of an aggressive mind-set, knowing that we were going to have to possess the ball against this team, knowing that we were going to have to score touchdowns. We went for it on fourth down, obviously we didn’t get it. I put the defense in a couple of bad positions in that particular situation.
“Defensively, I thought it was just some inconsistency. You’ve got to give (the Rams) credit, they made a lot of plays. There were some plays that they made that were contested throws, contested catches, and they made the play and we didn’t. And then there were some times where we didn’t play things exactly how we needed to and got exposed. I just think overall, there’s just too much inconsistency in that game for us to be able to win.”
Allen said the Saints need to be better at establishing the running game, which averaged 2.2 yards per carry on 16 attempts. The longest run went for five yards.
“We have not run the ball well enough, which has made us have to rely way too much on the passing game,” he said. “I do think our play-action passing game has been much better, but we’ve got to be able to run the ball more effectively so we can be a more balanced offense. That has to happen.
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“I think we’ve got to do a better job of creating some movement up front, of creating some seams in the running game. There’s a lot of factors that go into the running game.
It goes without saying that the queue needs to move and make room. We need to improve our outside blocking performance. Additionally, we need to get better at hitting the ball where it has to be hit in order to set up some plays. That is the area of discrepancy.
“There are several plays in which nine or ten players are doing well, but there are also plays in which one or two players fall short of expectations and the play is ultimately unsuccessful. That we haven’t been able to run the ball more effectively is frustrating.”
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