Saints coach shows how frustrated he truly is after loss to division rival in Week 4

“Sucks to lose a game like that. Those are the kind that f***ing — excuse me — rip your heart out. But we know we have a good football team.”

-- Dennis Allen via Mike Triplett

Part of the blame must go on Allen, though. His teams over the past few seasons have struggled in crunch time, particularly on defense.

According to Fletcher Mackel, the Saints are 0-4 under Allen when their opponent starts a drive with between 2:30 and 1:00 left in the fourth quarter with the Saints ahead by 6 or less.

Allen's play-calling over the past couple of games, in crunch time, has been a bit of a head scratcher. This week, he played aggressive man coverage on second and long with just over thirty seconds left for Atlanta. 

They just had to get in field goal range to take the lead and the win. That came back to bite him when Falcons WR Darnell Mooney got past Paulson Adebo outside. Adebo committed pass interference and put the ball in Saints territory for ATL. 

They did not have to gain another yard in order to be in range for kicker Younghoe Koo. 

Allen did not learn his lesson from Week 3 loss

Last weekend, the Saints HC called man coverage once again on a long third down for Philadelphia. 

An unfortunate collision in the secondary affected three Saints defenders and tight end Dallas Goedert picked up a massive gain to set up a go-ahead TD for the Eagles. 

Both moves by Allen were costly. 

Of course, hindsight is always 20/20. New Orleans' afggressive nature has lent itself well in many other scenarios. but with a banged up unit, playing zone may have made more sense for the Saints in those spots to grab victories. 

Allen is cleary upset after two winnable games got flushed late for New Orleans. That desperation needs to make a change for him going forward. 

New Orleans could be 4-0 right now. Instead, the Saints are 2-2 with a matchup with the Kansas City Chiefs looming in Week 5.