Dolphins offensive coordinator Dan Henning defends 1st-and-goal interception

(Blog has been down for more than two hours, sorry for the delay.) DAVIE – Dan Henning stood by his 1st-and-goal call gone bad at Buffalo last Sunday. During his weekly media session, the Dolphins’ offensive coordinator addressed the play publicly for the first time, offering several reasons to justify why he asked running back Ricky Williams to pass the ball on 1st down from the Bills 3. The play ended with an interception instead of seven easy points on the Dolphins’ opening drive during last week’s loss at Buffalo. “We don’t apologize,” he said. “We lament like everyone else.” Many wonder why Henning didn’t just call a hand-off to Williams, who’d rushed for 33 yards on five carries on the series against the NFL’s 31st-ranked run defense. But Henning isn’t second-guessing himself more than he would on any play that didn’t work. “I’d like to have every call I ever made that wasn’t successful back,” he said. “Can’t do it. That’s not the way this works.” This play call in particular seemed to buck all the percentages. Henning saw it differently. He said Williams had completed the pass every time Miami practiced it the previous three weeks. “100 percent,” Henning said. But Williams also hadn’t thrown a pass during a game since the 2000 season. Henning also

pointed out the Dolphins have been much more right than wrong once inside the 10. He said Miami is the NFL’s most-efficient offense there – with 18 TDs and two first-down FGs in 23 trips. And some of those plays might have drawn scrutiny if they hadn’t worked. “My job is to get the ball in the end zone when we get down there,” he said. “I don’t make excuses for how we do it. “And if you look at the 18 (TDs), there are some other calls you all would have asked the same question about if they were not successful.” Henning went on to say the play that led to Williams’ interception ultimately set up a touchdown because the Bills had to respect the pass out of the Wildcat. “Later on when we got in there, we walked in, which helped that whole process out,” Henning said. “But we don’t talk about those things, we only talk about, ‘Oh (shoot), we made an interception why would he call that? It’s always the call. “So I don’t worry about the criticism. My job is to get the ball in the end zone – and this year we’re the best at it in the NFL.”

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Dolphins offensive coordinator Dan Henning defends 1st-and-goal interception

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