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Or maybe I should title it "ND defense vs our offense". Say what you want about BVG, but he put together the best scheme against us I have seen yet that took advantage of his kid's abilities. He had us confused a lot of the time. Basically, their defense dictated the flow of the game and not our offense. Those kids ran a sophisticated group of plays from multiple formations against us, AND they covered a lot of ground with good speed and defeated blocks at the second level. In my estimation, #23, #9, #38, #90, and #91 are all SPECIAL type players with bright futures. We could not get #23 on the ground. #9 was faster than our ABs. #38 gave us fits in pursuit.
I can't emphasize enough how ready these guys were compared to most teams we go against. For example, when we would run counter option the "supposed" play side LBs and safeties would flow with the fake motion, but the "supposed" back side guy would fire to the "real playside" LOS immediately without hesitation as if he knew the counter was coming. I haven't really seen this yet. If you wonder why we didn't run a lot of counter, this is why.
ND ran four different and distinct formations that I could distinguish against our base formation. Each of them was easily adapted when we motioned guys or put someone in the slot. The first we have seen a ton recently, the basic 4-3 with the MLB deep and 2 safeties about 9 yds back. The second was a 4-4 with the outside guys basically over in the slot. The third was what I would call a 3-5 with the MLB deep and the other 4 spread out as far as the slots. The fourth was a straight 6 man front. They mixed these formations on the fly and not merely every series, or after making a half time adjustment. This is why we had trouble getting plays off. Counting the heads and trying to figure out where to run plays had to be difficult. I saw them mix up plays and responsibilities from each formation, like A gap blitz, who takes QB, who takes dive, delayed blitz on the pass plays very well.
Contrary to what some people may be thinking, I do not feel like we got whipped up front physically. Our OL looked strong and got a lot of movement. The biggest thing their DL did EXTREMELY well was disrupt our OL flow to the second level. It was the best I have seen. Their LBs are good athletes anyway and we didn't get to them like we would have wanted. I give BVG and staff a solid "A" for team preparation. He deserves it. I didn't know a lot about him coming in, but I have respect for what he did for this game.
With all that said, folks, we played poorly. We really did. Some of it was just fundamental stuff. Some of it was just ugly. If we didn't trip over the turf monster, we ran to wrong side of the QB. If we didn't force our pitch key to commit, we blocked the wrong guy for the play on the end of the line. If we didn't make a poor throw, we made a half hearted attempt at a block in space. It was one of those games where it seemed we all took turns screwing something up, just enough so that it would kill our down and distance flow. If we didn't put our foot in the ground to get what we could out of a play instead of dancing around, we put the ball on the ground. The speed of the game was different than we have experienced yet this season and we reacted poorly.
On to the positions.
At QB JT got flustered and lost his composure some. He played his worst game to date. He was dealt a tough hand, but his team needed him to handle it better. At times he looked like VL with his indecision. He didn't get going up field enough to force commits and he didn't dive forward for 2 yards when it was there, preferring to do the HS play where you run around and keep things alive hoping to break free. ND is a fast defense and they weren't going to be outflanked like that, but they could have been out executed if we played right. We need to keep moving forward every play as an offense and do anything possible to avoid the loss. Diving forward for 2 is always better than taking the loss hoping for something big. He missed some throws too.
At the OL, we could have played better. You may be surprised, but I like what I saw a lot of the time. We can block people, even good players. Shamire gets good movement out of EVERY guy he goes against. It really doesn't matter how good they are. He is as physically dominant as I have seen at his position. Consistency is an issue, especially when he is on the move in space, but I would say he has improved pulling. I am encouraged about him. Both of our OTs had kind of lack luster games if you ask me. They made some plays, but got beat some too. We just have to raise the bar on the BAD plays and make them not as bad, if that makes any sense. Nobody got through to the second level the way you would like. Personally, I think that was ND's top goal, to let their speed guys at the second level make plays. I think ND had the best idea of what our blockers try to do and subsequently disrupted it pretty well.
At AB, it hard to describe how ineffectual we were trying to get #23 and #9 to the ground. What I feared I was seeing against Alcorn St. and Tulane reared its ugly head Saturday. Ike Willis just didn't get it done blocking. Neither did anybody else. Snoddy made some good blocks, but not always. I understand they are tough guys to block, but we simply have to do better. I really really like our ABs in space as receivers, Marshall got held on the overthrow in the EZ btw. We have good hands and we are slippery running routes, but we have to block. I just chuckled watching them block to the inside a few times. You have to give ND some credit, their #9 and their safeties ran right with our ABs on plays where we realeased instead of blocked. We didn't get as free as we usually do up the seam.
I am going to try to be delicate when talking about our WRs. I am a little worried about the level of effort..... ( I am sorry. I am self - editing some pretty harsh comments about this group that involved specific names. I had a entire paragraph that was pretty much written as if I was yelling at my own team. That doesn't belong in here)....... OK, I wasn't delicate, but if I was their coach, that is what I would tell them.
At BB Skov continues to play hard. He had some brain cramps at times too. I have to remind myself that he is a rookie here. When he ran on the wrong side of JT on that midline in the RZ I felt like throwing my fist through the wall. For me, that was the straw that broke my back after a ton of miscues to that point. That play was set nicely for a "give" and I had been hoping to see midline against that formation all game. I don't think we ran another one.
In the end, here is my analysis:
Do I think ND is good? Heck yes. Do I think we can beat them? Heck yes. We just weren't ready to do it on this day with what they threw at us. I don't think this game is the end of all hope that identifies us. Not at all. I see this as the game that SHOULD change us and galvanize us to some degree. If nothing else it shows us that winning isn't automatic. We need to address some things, especially blocking in space. We can play better and we will need to play better. I am sure CPJ feels bad about this loss, maybe more than some other losses because we weren't really ready in a lot of ways, whether schematically or frame of mind. I could see we were tight when the game started. I could see we were a little confused. We just never really got it together or got the momentum reversed. We lost 3 games last year and most of us think it was a special season. There is a lot of water to go under the bridge in 2015. Our goals are all still on the table.
I can't emphasize enough how ready these guys were compared to most teams we go against. For example, when we would run counter option the "supposed" play side LBs and safeties would flow with the fake motion, but the "supposed" back side guy would fire to the "real playside" LOS immediately without hesitation as if he knew the counter was coming. I haven't really seen this yet. If you wonder why we didn't run a lot of counter, this is why.
ND ran four different and distinct formations that I could distinguish against our base formation. Each of them was easily adapted when we motioned guys or put someone in the slot. The first we have seen a ton recently, the basic 4-3 with the MLB deep and 2 safeties about 9 yds back. The second was a 4-4 with the outside guys basically over in the slot. The third was what I would call a 3-5 with the MLB deep and the other 4 spread out as far as the slots. The fourth was a straight 6 man front. They mixed these formations on the fly and not merely every series, or after making a half time adjustment. This is why we had trouble getting plays off. Counting the heads and trying to figure out where to run plays had to be difficult. I saw them mix up plays and responsibilities from each formation, like A gap blitz, who takes QB, who takes dive, delayed blitz on the pass plays very well.
Contrary to what some people may be thinking, I do not feel like we got whipped up front physically. Our OL looked strong and got a lot of movement. The biggest thing their DL did EXTREMELY well was disrupt our OL flow to the second level. It was the best I have seen. Their LBs are good athletes anyway and we didn't get to them like we would have wanted. I give BVG and staff a solid "A" for team preparation. He deserves it. I didn't know a lot about him coming in, but I have respect for what he did for this game.
With all that said, folks, we played poorly. We really did. Some of it was just fundamental stuff. Some of it was just ugly. If we didn't trip over the turf monster, we ran to wrong side of the QB. If we didn't force our pitch key to commit, we blocked the wrong guy for the play on the end of the line. If we didn't make a poor throw, we made a half hearted attempt at a block in space. It was one of those games where it seemed we all took turns screwing something up, just enough so that it would kill our down and distance flow. If we didn't put our foot in the ground to get what we could out of a play instead of dancing around, we put the ball on the ground. The speed of the game was different than we have experienced yet this season and we reacted poorly.
On to the positions.
At QB JT got flustered and lost his composure some. He played his worst game to date. He was dealt a tough hand, but his team needed him to handle it better. At times he looked like VL with his indecision. He didn't get going up field enough to force commits and he didn't dive forward for 2 yards when it was there, preferring to do the HS play where you run around and keep things alive hoping to break free. ND is a fast defense and they weren't going to be outflanked like that, but they could have been out executed if we played right. We need to keep moving forward every play as an offense and do anything possible to avoid the loss. Diving forward for 2 is always better than taking the loss hoping for something big. He missed some throws too.
At the OL, we could have played better. You may be surprised, but I like what I saw a lot of the time. We can block people, even good players. Shamire gets good movement out of EVERY guy he goes against. It really doesn't matter how good they are. He is as physically dominant as I have seen at his position. Consistency is an issue, especially when he is on the move in space, but I would say he has improved pulling. I am encouraged about him. Both of our OTs had kind of lack luster games if you ask me. They made some plays, but got beat some too. We just have to raise the bar on the BAD plays and make them not as bad, if that makes any sense. Nobody got through to the second level the way you would like. Personally, I think that was ND's top goal, to let their speed guys at the second level make plays. I think ND had the best idea of what our blockers try to do and subsequently disrupted it pretty well.
At AB, it hard to describe how ineffectual we were trying to get #23 and #9 to the ground. What I feared I was seeing against Alcorn St. and Tulane reared its ugly head Saturday. Ike Willis just didn't get it done blocking. Neither did anybody else. Snoddy made some good blocks, but not always. I understand they are tough guys to block, but we simply have to do better. I really really like our ABs in space as receivers, Marshall got held on the overthrow in the EZ btw. We have good hands and we are slippery running routes, but we have to block. I just chuckled watching them block to the inside a few times. You have to give ND some credit, their #9 and their safeties ran right with our ABs on plays where we realeased instead of blocked. We didn't get as free as we usually do up the seam.
I am going to try to be delicate when talking about our WRs. I am a little worried about the level of effort..... ( I am sorry. I am self - editing some pretty harsh comments about this group that involved specific names. I had a entire paragraph that was pretty much written as if I was yelling at my own team. That doesn't belong in here)....... OK, I wasn't delicate, but if I was their coach, that is what I would tell them.
At BB Skov continues to play hard. He had some brain cramps at times too. I have to remind myself that he is a rookie here. When he ran on the wrong side of JT on that midline in the RZ I felt like throwing my fist through the wall. For me, that was the straw that broke my back after a ton of miscues to that point. That play was set nicely for a "give" and I had been hoping to see midline against that formation all game. I don't think we ran another one.
In the end, here is my analysis:
Do I think ND is good? Heck yes. Do I think we can beat them? Heck yes. We just weren't ready to do it on this day with what they threw at us. I don't think this game is the end of all hope that identifies us. Not at all. I see this as the game that SHOULD change us and galvanize us to some degree. If nothing else it shows us that winning isn't automatic. We need to address some things, especially blocking in space. We can play better and we will need to play better. I am sure CPJ feels bad about this loss, maybe more than some other losses because we weren't really ready in a lot of ways, whether schematically or frame of mind. I could see we were tight when the game started. I could see we were a little confused. We just never really got it together or got the momentum reversed. We lost 3 games last year and most of us think it was a special season. There is a lot of water to go under the bridge in 2015. Our goals are all still on the table.
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