if you watched all of the shitshows for the last 25 years, I am willing to be nearly all of them had a similar theme in the postmortem analysis. I, and I am willing to bet virtually everyone on this board, is tired of saying to themselves...if we had just caught the ball, or had one of those questionable reviews upheld, or not overturned, or if we hadn't committed dumb penalties, maybe, just maybe we win.
As a fan base, at some point the excuses must end, even for coaches that have had two teams go 12-0 in the regular season. However, I do not think this is just a Brian Kelly coaching issue. I believe the coach, the players, the university, the athletic department, and even the fans have some blame in this continuing theme of shitshows. But what I am more surprised is why anyone on this board is all that surprised at the outcome of this game. I guess it should be expected that a fan base has hope that their team can win against large odds, but at some point doesn't reality catch up to fantasy?