What leads you to believe this? Why would the OC who scripted an up tempo start with the QB, suddenly decide to not keep what worked so well?
That's a defensive mindset that wanted to try and slow the game down cause he didn't want to end up in a shootout.
McDermott was the one who failed at the end of the half sending out the punt unit with like 15 seconds left, instead of a hail Mary. The moment was too big for him and he didn't have a time out to slow things down so he could think about what to do.
Which is the second blunder he has made with less than 20 seconds on the clock. He never even should of sent the punting unit out there.