I have never cared for this saying. No disrespect to you, I just think it misses the point.

It's easy for us to sit here and say "well, if so and so had done this, and what's his name had done that, it wouldn't have come down to the officials".

But you have two teams who are both trying to win. Nothing is easy. You make mistakes, but you're still fighting and clawing to do whatever you can to win... And then the refs make a terrible, bone-headed call that has nothing to do with the competition on the field, and has everything to do with whatever they "think" happened. They simply "see" something that isn't there, or don't see something that clearly is. So, yeah, you can say that players could have done things better, but it shouldn't be assumed that because a game is close, the players just screwed it up. They are going up against another NFL team who is trying to stop them. Refs are not going up against anything.

Games should be won and lost by the players. It's one thing for refs to make small mistakes. It's another thing, entirely, when they are flat out blowing calls.