Denver Broncos coach Nathaniel Hackett said Tuesday that he should have let quarterback Russell Wilson run a fourth-and-5 play in the closing seconds of Monday night's loss in Seattle.
"I think it would have been better to go for it," he said. You look back at it and say "of course we should have gone for it, we missed the field goal." We knew we had a plan in place.
Everything else about his debut as a head coach was overshadowed by Hackett's decision.
The longest field goal in the history of Lumen Field is 56 yards, and only two kickers in the National Football League have ever made field goal attempts of at least 64 yards.
On attempts of at least 60 yards in his career, McManus is 1-of-5, including Monday night's miss.
The teams converted 48 percent of their fourth-and-5 plays. After talking to the special teams coaches and McManus in pre-game, he understood how few kickers have made an attempt of at least 64 yards.
If the Broncos got to the 46-yard line on third down, a field goal attempt would be made. Wilson moved the ball to the Seattle 46 after completing a 9-yard pass to Williams.
If Williams had gained more yards, we would have gone for it.
The 46-yard line was where the team wanted to be. It didn't work but that's part of it.
Being in this profession is part of being in this seat. Even when my dad was a coach, you're prepared for that, it's been happening my entire career. You need to keep going.
The Broncos lost two turnovers in the game and had a drive derailed by a false start penalty in the third quarter. Wilson threw for 340 yards and the Broncos out-gained the Seahawks by a wide margin.
In the second half, the Broncos defense held the Seattle offense to just 34 total yards.
"In the end, that was our plan, that was the yard line we had to get to, we all said in the huddle before we did it," he said. "Couldn't have gotten to that" The red zone is something that frustrates me more than the last decision. We were close to a lot of the opportunities.