Now that I have had time to recover from what was a devastating loss I thought I would jot down some observations and some thoughts for public consumption.
Was the loss devastating? From a fan and overall program perspective my answer is yes. There was a lot of chatter and focus to build up the program, get people excited about this year and out to games. That was accomplished, 51,000 fans saw the game but even the marketing folks have to realize momentum was lost on Saturday. The product wasn’t better. It was the opposite of when the last staff took over saying that they didn’t have much but needed to rebuild. Every win that year was a pleasant surprise and the offense was exciting to watch. Hindsight always giving a proper perspective there was more talent then than stated and more than there appears to be now.
Is this was I expected? Yes. All of the hype was done really well but that didn't change the overall youth and talent level of our team. I have seen comments that we need to coach them up. That is absolutely true but it wasn’t like all of our players turned into 4th year juniors and 5th year seniors overnight. It is still a youth movement and they aren’t that deep. Great job in the 1st half (held them to 7 points) but they got gassed in the 2nd half when BYU started running downhill.
Overall, I was more disappointed in the offense than the defense. The defense gave up a total of 392.0 yards. Less than Ohio State (Oregon State), Auburn (Washington), USC (UNLV), Washington (Auburn) and Penn State (Appalachian State). While it was frustrating watching more of the same “can’t get off the field on 3rd down” I felt like it wasn’t as bad as last year. They did get some stops.
The offense, on the other hand, was a complete mystery to me. From the get go they didn’t have plan in the red zone and it only worked when the did some zone read in the second half. At the beginning of the game they were moving the ball but sputtered out when they got into scoring position. I thought the offensive line played ok but the issue that has plagued us for years was highlighted again, we just don’t have the receivers. Shun is great but is there any receiver on our roster that strikes fear into defenses? The answer is no. We went deep more often than a porno but never could get that separation. What was BYU’s answer? Pass interference. They did it all night and didn’t get called for quite a few including one in the end zone that the TV commentators completely missed. You need fast, physical receivers to create separation on deep throws and I don’t see that happening. If you can’t do it against BYU you aren’t going to get it done in the PAC-12. Maybe the staff thought they had Mike Evans back on the roster, I don’t know but they are going to need to establish the fear of the running game in order to free up some passing lanes in my opinion. They just don't have a throw it up and they will go get it receiver on the roster that I have seen.
Is all lost? No but (and I hope I am wrong about this) I see us ending up around 0.500 this year. There are just too many missing pieces this year and not enough depth to be a better than average team.
Then again maybe BYU is going to run the table, go undefeated and make the playoff and all of our angst is much ado about nothing. BYU plays Cal at home this week.
Thoughts?
Was the loss devastating? From a fan and overall program perspective my answer is yes. There was a lot of chatter and focus to build up the program, get people excited about this year and out to games. That was accomplished, 51,000 fans saw the game but even the marketing folks have to realize momentum was lost on Saturday. The product wasn’t better. It was the opposite of when the last staff took over saying that they didn’t have much but needed to rebuild. Every win that year was a pleasant surprise and the offense was exciting to watch. Hindsight always giving a proper perspective there was more talent then than stated and more than there appears to be now.
Is this was I expected? Yes. All of the hype was done really well but that didn't change the overall youth and talent level of our team. I have seen comments that we need to coach them up. That is absolutely true but it wasn’t like all of our players turned into 4th year juniors and 5th year seniors overnight. It is still a youth movement and they aren’t that deep. Great job in the 1st half (held them to 7 points) but they got gassed in the 2nd half when BYU started running downhill.
Overall, I was more disappointed in the offense than the defense. The defense gave up a total of 392.0 yards. Less than Ohio State (Oregon State), Auburn (Washington), USC (UNLV), Washington (Auburn) and Penn State (Appalachian State). While it was frustrating watching more of the same “can’t get off the field on 3rd down” I felt like it wasn’t as bad as last year. They did get some stops.
The offense, on the other hand, was a complete mystery to me. From the get go they didn’t have plan in the red zone and it only worked when the did some zone read in the second half. At the beginning of the game they were moving the ball but sputtered out when they got into scoring position. I thought the offensive line played ok but the issue that has plagued us for years was highlighted again, we just don’t have the receivers. Shun is great but is there any receiver on our roster that strikes fear into defenses? The answer is no. We went deep more often than a porno but never could get that separation. What was BYU’s answer? Pass interference. They did it all night and didn’t get called for quite a few including one in the end zone that the TV commentators completely missed. You need fast, physical receivers to create separation on deep throws and I don’t see that happening. If you can’t do it against BYU you aren’t going to get it done in the PAC-12. Maybe the staff thought they had Mike Evans back on the roster, I don’t know but they are going to need to establish the fear of the running game in order to free up some passing lanes in my opinion. They just don't have a throw it up and they will go get it receiver on the roster that I have seen.
Is all lost? No but (and I hope I am wrong about this) I see us ending up around 0.500 this year. There are just too many missing pieces this year and not enough depth to be a better than average team.
Then again maybe BYU is going to run the table, go undefeated and make the playoff and all of our angst is much ado about nothing. BYU plays Cal at home this week.
Thoughts?
