Seattle Seahawks coach Pete Carroll — whose controversial goal-line call clinched a Super Bowl victory for the New England Patriots — tells TODAY's Matt Lauer he's been "sleeping some" in the days following the game, but remains confident that the call won't haunt him for years to come.
WATCH: Matt Lauer's full interview with Pete Carroll
"These occurrences have stayed with me over the years in a manner that they fuel me," Carroll explained in the exclusive interview.
Many fans and pundits criticized Carroll's decision to pass the ball only a yard from the goal line and not give it to star running back Marshawn Lynch, who led the NFL with 17 touchdowns during the regular season, as the worst call in NFL history.
“It’s the worst result of a call ever,'' Carroll said. "The call would have been a great one if we'd caught it. It would have been just fine and nobody would have thought twice about it. We knew we were going to throw the ball one time in the sequence somewhere, and so we did, and it just didn't turn out right.”
WATCH: 'It was the worst result of a call ever'
Carroll believes that he and his team will recover and become a story of redemption.
"It's well underway,'' he said.
While Carroll calls himself an optimist, he admitted to some sleepless nights in the aftermath of the Super Bowl. “I wake up and can't stop thinking about it,’’ he said.
“The sleep part works because you're so worn out after the six months of the season that you can't help but fall asleep. But it's the waking up…and getting back to sleep [that] is the challenge.”
Carroll admitted to shedding tears once over the loss. “Just, lying in bed with [my wife] Glena,’’ he said. "Like, in the middle of the night, you know? 4:05 in the a.m. That’s what happened. That was my opportunity to go ahead and visit it.”