MIKE MACDONALD: All right, man, I mean, a great football game. We’ve got to give Minnesota a lot of credit. The reason their record is what it is and what their record is in one-score games is because they’re a good football team. We hung in there and had an opportunity win the game. We didn’t. There are things in all three phases we can do better, but did a lot of great things. Gave ourselves a chance to win. And so we’re on a short week, so we’ve got to go back to work in about an hour. We will be back and rocking. We got a good plan. But our destiny is not in our hands right now, which is tough. But we still have a ton of football to play for. A break here or there, we’re right back in it and rolling. So we’ll dust ourselves off, chin up, chest out, and move forward. Onward we go.
Towards the end of the game what was the limit on Myers?
MIKE MACDONALD: Let’s just say that was the top range of where we felt we could make it.
Assuming the fact was fourth and 15 eliminated the —
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah. You got three options: kick it, punt it and try to play for a field goal less than a minute to go, or try to make it and tie it up and try to go win the game. You talk about those situations, we want to go win the game. We’re not trying to play defensive. That’s how we call it. So we wanted to call an aggressive game. We felt like that was the best decision at that time.
What happened on their final touchdown?
MIKE MACDONALD: They made a great play. I think we Cover 2 to that side and threw a seven cut. Just couldn’t get there.
The face mask on Byron Murphy II, really big play. Looked like a legit call.
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, (I’ve) got to look at it. That’s what we’re talking about. The guy is fighting his tail off to get to the quarterback. You’ve got to be careful where your hands are. There is a lot of stuff going on in that moment, too. We could have had a third-and-18 with two downs to go to try and seal it, and all of a sudden two plays later now we’re down three. So, that’s how close we are, but we’re not there yet obviously. But that’s an example of the fight in the guys and how they’re playing.
Some unforced errors that you guys committed against a good team.
MIKE MACDONALD: Against a team like this, the unforced errors has to get cleaned up. It starts with me. So we’ll look at it just like we do every week. Look at it and make adjustments and move forward. But we have to clean up the procedural stuff.
How is Kenneth Walker III?
MIKE MACDONALD: Has an ankle (injury). Going to get imaging right now. Not sure the extent of it.
What did you see on the final pass from Geno Smith? Miscommunication?
MIKE MACDONALD: No, no. I’ve got to look at the tape. I’ve got to look at the tape. Get back to you tomorrow.
How do you evaluate that game (and Geno Smith)? Some really good things, a couple scoring drives.
MIKE MACDONALD: Geno is our top competitor on our football team. We’re not sitting here with life at the end of December unless Geno has done the things he’s done. He’s a fighter, man. I thought he played a good game.
Your running backs averaged four yards per carry, 14 carries, 78 percent pass distribution. Is that starting to become concerning that in these games you’re not able to establish more balance?
MIKE MACDONALD: We’ve got to start faster on defense and put ourselves in better position. Some of it was Minnesota’s personnel groups, how they’re matching us. I think in some of those either-or spots when we are able to pass it, that was efficient as well.
Jaxon Smith-Njigba, another solid game; 1,000-yard season. What have you made of what he’s done over the last couple months?
MIKE MACDONALD: Jaxon (Smith-Njigba) is playing great football for us, fighting his tail off. We love him. Happy for him.
What was your message to him in there?
MIKE MACDONALD: Just what I told you guys. You know, it should hurt. We’ve worked incredibly hard. We have been through a ton of adversity as a team. We’re going to stick together and go back to work. So we’re fighting for the right to stay alive, on a short week. What are you going to do?
Mike, on the fast start from the defense, did you get the intent, physicality that you needed?
MIKE MACDONALD: Yeah, these teams got the opening scripts and they got stuff. I thought our guys were poised and played hard. We didn’t have many miscommunications. Just they went down and scored. Our guys rebounded and I thought defensively they fought their tails off all game. Played a physical game. The ball was alive. We didn’t take it away. To beat a team like this you’ve got to (make them) turn the ball over. We weren’t able to do that.
Mike, you didn’t have Riq out there for the first defensive series. What was the reason?
MIKE MACDONALD: Just a team rule thing. We made it right and that’s what we decided to do, what was best for the football team. We’ll move forward.
How do you think he responded after that?
MIKE MACDONALD: I felt like he played a good game. Again, we’ll see what the opportunities were. He did have a couple pass break ups so it was good.
The fake punt, was that something they saw or something you called from the sidelines?
MIKE MACDONALD: I don’t really want to air out why we’re calling fakes or when. I’ll just credit Jay (Harbaugh) and our operation. Guys did a great job executing it. Gave us a chance to extend the drive. We’re trying to go win or looking for any edge we can find. We’re going to try to go exploit it.
