Lions’ red-zone offense not good enough for Cooter

Allen Park – Matt Prater has been dominating the NFC Special Teams Player of the Week award recently, winning it three times in four games, but Detroit Lions offensive coordinator Jim Bob Cooter thinks enough is enough.

While Cooter is grateful for Prater’s consistency, putting points on the board when the offense stalls, the coordinator wants to see more touchdowns when Detroit drives into the red zone.

“He keeps getting them, we’ve got to quit getting him these field goals,” Cooter said. “He’s extremely reliable, we feel really good when we turn it over to him. But, like I said, I’d like to watch him kick a few more extra points than field goals.”

In last week’s victory over the Saints, Prater made a career-high five field goals, primarily because the Lions went 1-5 once they drove inside the 20.

“We’ve traditionally been pretty good in the red zone around here, kind of pride ourselves on scoring touchdowns down there,” Cooter said. “Did not have a good week. That was execution, that was communication, there’s several play calls I would like back. I thought New Orleans did a good job switching up what they were doing, and I didn’t adjust as well as I would’ve liked to.

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“Our guys I would’ve liked to execute a little better on the field, but I could’ve certainly helped them out quite a bit,” Cooter said. “But there’s a lot of things that we as an offense could do better to score more down there, and I’m leading the charge with that. I’ve got to improve.”

The Lions finished second in red-zone efficiency in 2015, scoring touchdowns on 69.4 percent of their trips. After the disappointing effort against the Saints, the Lions rank 17th this season, putting six on the board 55.9 percent of the time. It’s a big reason the team is averaging just 22.9 points, which ranks 18th.