Ugliest game I've seen anywhere in a long time. What was it, 24 penalties and more than 250 yds? I think most of the penalties were holding, which means that they're probably penalties from effort and not from attention lapses. Coaches usually don't mind effort penalties, but when you have so many it means you're getting beat or lacking technique. I can understand Nathan wanting to drive another nail in T'erd's coffin at the end, so the taunting penalty is understandable (and Solich didn't seem to mind). But as a 6th-year senior he needs to be aware of the situation. Once he had the interception, all he had to do was fall down, and the game was over. Trying to lateral could've had bad consequences if a T'erd player had picked it up and gone the other way.
I wonder how much of T'erd's performance is due to having played last Sunday in the heat. Having to recover from a game like that makes a short week even shorter.
Still, gotta give the D coaches a lot of credit. Except for one play, they really shut down T'erd's biggest weapon, Johnson. And got into Birdsong's head early and often. I was really surprised that T'erd didn't run Johnson on their last drive. We were playing prevent, which would've given him a lot of room for another big run.
And the D executed very well. They controlled the line but at the same time covered T'erd's receivers like a blanket. A lot of energy but still keeping focus. Great job.
Offense under Sprague needs a lot of work. Don't know if it was the personnel (White is much better in the slot than in the backfield) or the execution, but the second half was hard to watch until the final drive. It was apparent that the O line was taking control and AJ was being AJ. One of the best drives we've had in a long time; got a TD and ate a lot of clock.
But the bottom line is an ugly win is still a win. We're 2-0 for the first time since '12 and hopefully will be 3-0 when we face the Gophers in two weeks. Still have a lot of work to do, but the Bell is ours for four years.
Why do we feel bad or even take into account things like "they played last sunday?" They had 6 days to recover. When LeBron flies overnight and checks into his thousand dollar a night hotel we feel bad that he has a game the next night? These are kids. Kids are resilient. Do not diminish from our win. We beat a Bowl team and made their QB look like an 8th grader. OU...Oh yeahhh
Not feeling bad, but not great either. In the second half we had something like 12 plays and 55 yds until the last drive. Not good at all. Still have a lot of work to do on offense. Not sure we can count on our D to have this kind of performance every game.
And, frankly, I don't give a sh*t about Lebron. He gets paid millions for what he does so he should be out there every night. As you mentioned, these are kids (who don't paid to do what they do) and they need time to recoup. I remember in '96 we played a Saturday night game in Hawaii and our guys didn't get back until Sunday night Athens time. I think that had an effect on our guys the next Saturday when we blew a second half lead at Army. Our guys not playing for ten days may have given us a competitive edge tonight.
Last Edited: 9/13/2015 12:05:25 AM by Pataskala