MIAMI – It is the time of night that Dan Reeves says he gets tired, the week of the year he is tired of losing.
It’s four defeats for him in the Super Bowl now, none of them close. “It doesn’t get any easier,” he said after the Falcons’ 34-19 loss to the Broncos last night. “The more you have, the more they hurt.
“But if you don’t get here you can’t win. Society is built on competition. When you have given it everything you have, you move on.”
Reeves had to give more than he should have six weeks after heart bypass surgery, one night before the Super Bowl. Eugene Robinson, one of his top defensive players, one of his leaders, was arrested for allegedly soliciting a prostitute.
“I don’t know, I don’t think it was a major factor,” he said. “We spent a lot of time talking, I asked him if he felt like he was ready to play and he said he [was].
“My major concern was Eugene Robinson. I’m disappointed any time you have somebody that does something. You are disappointed but I don’t know anyone who hasn’t made mistakes in their life.
“I’m not going to crucify him. We love him unconditionally. Nobody is more disappointed than Eugene.”
Except maybe Reeves, who didn’t deserve the distraction, didn’t deserve the anxiety, didn’t deserve to be asked the same questions four times by the relentless media mob.
“We talked to his family,” he finally said after a long pause, his face getting redder as he spoke. “It’s a tough thing for anybody to go through. We are more concerned about him personally.
“And I am NOT,” he said, banging his hand down on the podium, “going to talk about it anymore.”
And he didn’t. “Three interceptions, you have to give their defense credit,” Reeves said. They knocked one of them up in the air and on the other Chris thought their guy was going to come underenath and they made a good play. They got the ball into the end zone and we didn’t.”
You can blame Morten Andersen, who missed a chip-shot field goal. You can blame Jamal Anderson, who in short-yardage situations ran like Loni Anderson.
But maybe the real fault that Super Bowl XXXIII was a dud belongs to Gary Anderson, for missing the field goal that would have sent a team capable of, if not stopping the unstoppable Broncos, then at least maybe outscoring them.
The Falcons came up short of muscle in short yardage, far short of John Elway on a pass rush that failed to make him look 38 years old, and short of arm when three times Chris Chandler was intercepted in the second half. One was deflected, arguably after Chandler had held the ball too long, the others were forces into coverage.
The Falcons’ defensive strategy was faulty. They didn’t use their best cover guy, Ray Buchanan, against the Broncos’ best deep threat, Rod Smith. William Bradford, the corner on Smith’s side, gave Elway no further reason to contemplate retirement.
In the second quarter Smith ran by Bradford, ran by Eugene Robinson faster than the undercover cop had read him his rights, ran under a perfectly thrown ball at the Atlanta 42 and ran the rest of the way for an 80-yard TD, the second-longest pass in Super Bowl history.
Thanks to a Dan Neil holding call and two missed Jason Elam field goals, the Falcons were not out of opportunities. And not out of ways to squander them. They were across midfield when Chandler tried to force a ball into Mathis and was picked off by Darius Johnson. On the next possession, Anderson cranked out first downs on runs of 13 and 15 yards, putting Atlanta in business again at the Denver 21. On first down, a Chandler pass was deflected in the air like a bad punt. Darrien Gordon passed on the fair catch, ran it back 58 yards to the 24.
Howard Griffith pucnched it in and Denver had opened a 24-6 lead.
“They had a good game plan; they moved the ball around,” Reeves said. “John [Elway] is a great quarterback, he deserves to be MVP. We just couldn’t put any pressure on him.”
Instead, it fell on a coach who didn’t need it.
