#Postgame GT 9 - UVA 16

[roadkill]

Here’s what he said:


He screwed up. This is why you have coaches--to coach a player, to teach him to have game awareness.

Some of the posters here want to burn the player, but it looks obvious that the coaches don't have a plan B for when Sims goes down, and Gibson was the guy who had to go out and make the best of it.

We put a player on the field when he wasn't ready for it. He's taking a lot of heat for it, but it's the coaching staff's job to have the players ready, and to have the backup ready.

It's the player's responsibility to be ready too, but it looks like he wasn't getting many reps in practice. He started the game with almost no timing between him and his receivers, and his timing got better as the game went along.

I also understand why a backup wouldn't get many reps. When Payton Manning played for the Colts, the reporter asked the OC why the backup never got any snaps in practice. The OC answered "If Payton goes down, we're losing the game". We may be in the same position. (I'd love to have Manning's passer efficiency here, though)

Earlier in the year and over the summer, there were a lot of people here saying that he'd push Sims for starting time. A former player said he'd just be holding a clipboard and calling in plays--and that looks like what he was readier to do.

Now, we also want to put in the transfer from Clemson (Taisun Phommachanh). If Gibson wasn't ready, how ready do you think the players that the coaches DIDN'T put in are?

Last year, we had a gutsy kid in as backup. He didn't have the right "measurables" but he played his heart out when he got in. There was a huge amount of griping from some people here about whether he deserved a roster spot. He transferred out. Now, it doesn't look like we have a ready backup at all.

Now we gotta figure out what to do.

Zach was asked specifically about this in the post-game interviews. According to him, he "got a lot of practice with the 1's", and "had two great weeks of practice". He also said they "had a lot of plays that were there, we just didn't execute."
Based on his statement it appears that our coaches knew he might have to go in for Sims, and did what they could to prepare him. It obviously wasn't enough.

 

[Papa Foxtrot]

Lastly, Key made it really hard to keep this job. He can afford to lose two more games, uga and probably FSU and still be considered as a candidate. He has to have us in a bowl to even be considered. I don't see it happening.

I'm pretty sure that the Cinderella story ended with a thud last night. ADJB's first night in the Director's box, a national stage with lots of recruits in attendance. While it may be "possible" to recover from that performance, I doubt that it's likely. More's the pity - I like Key. He looks, acts and sounds like a real football coach.

 

[1979jacket]

It was more than just Sims going out though. We missed an XP, had a punt blocked, gave up big plays on D. It looked a lot more like the team from the first few games than the one from the last two.

Gave up big plays on defense?
Anybody that could criticize the defensive play last night just did not watch the same game I did. If you are on the field as much as our defense was, you are going to give up a 40 yard play at some point. The defense's ability to not collapse and continue to make stops was outstanding last night.

I'm not in love with Key but do see some improvement from Collins. Defense playing very well. Offense not playing well but play calling to me was ok except maybe 3rd and 1 call near goal line in first half. Special teams acceptable. We simply must have better QB play than we got last night and it up to this coaching staff to do something about it. Otherwise they should get no consideration in coaching search.

 

[yeti92]

Gave up big plays on defense?
Anybody that could criticize the defensive play last night just did not watch the same game I did. If you are on the field as much as our defense was, you are going to give up a 40 yard play at some point. The defense's ability to not collapse and continue to make stops was outstanding last night.

I'm not in love with Key but do see some improvement from Collins. Defense playing very well. Offense not playing well but play calling to me was ok except maybe 3rd and 1 call near goal line in first half. Special teams acceptable. We simply must have better QB play than we got last night and it up to this coaching staff to do something about it. Otherwise they should get no consideration in coaching search.

The defense's performance was certainly acceptable, they did more than enough to help us win, and I think we would take it most games, but there were definitely issues getting pressure on the QB and allowing receivers to get wide open.

 

[GT33]

Thank Jeffrey for all that.

You're welcome re-Todd.

 

[RamblinRed]

My question is how bad is the other 4* QB on our roster (Taisun Phommachonh) if he didn't even get a shot?

Given that during the spring game at Clemson before he transferred to GT Dabo called him a developmental QB, that probably tells you about all you need to know.

 

[RamblinRed]

I still think we made a bowl this year, unless Sims can't play.

I don't see that anymore. We need to win 3 of our last 5 - UGA is a non starter, so that is 3 of our last 4, and 3 of those 4 are on the road.
If we wanted to have a shot at a bowl game I felt like UVA was basically a must win.

I just don't see how we can score enough points to win 3 more games.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

The defense's performance was certainly acceptable, they did more than enough to help us win, and I think we would take it most games, but there were definitely issues getting pressure on the QB and allowing receivers to get wide open.

And tackling.

I would give them a B-. Gave up lots of yards, but did not give up many points. Held when they needed.

Offense would get a 0 and Special Teams a D.

 

[MWBATL]

I don't see that anymore. We need to win 3 of our last 5 - UGA is a non starter, so that is 3 of our last 4, and 3 of those 4 are on the road.
If we wanted to have a shot at a bowl game I felt like UVA was basically a must win.

I just don't see how we can score enough points to win 3 more games.

I'm not sure we can score enough to win 2 more games....and frankly even 1 more is doubtful imho...we are in the last tier of the ACC with UVa and VPI&SU

 

[GT33]

Given that during the spring game at Clemson before he transferred to GT Dabo called him a developmental QB, that probably tells you about all you need to know.

So almost exactly 1 year ago Dabo benched Uglylaylay for Taisun with 11:30 left in the 3rd quarter in the Pitt game while down 21-7, yet he's a developmental player and Dabo did not another QB to play, just Taisun?

 

[Augusta_Jacket]

I am not sure how we get to six wins. Do we beat VPISU? Yes, but who else?

Miami and UNC are beatable. Will we? Who knows, but they are winnable games.

 

[GT33]

Thank Jeffrey for all that.

oh man, I completely misread that post. I thought you ***** slapped me.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

Miami and UNC are beatable. Will we? Who knows, but they are winnable games.

They are beatable, but I am not sure we can score enough to keep up with UNC and Miami's defense is pretty stout.

 

[wesgt123]

I just didn’t want to lose because Virginia qb looks like a complete D bag.

 

[RamblinRed]

Like I said before, the defense was ok - i'd give them a C.

UVA did alot to help our D out. The D had 7 TFL - but for only -11 yards and 0 sacks. They were not really able to get any consistent pressure on the QB. We were pretty lucky that Armstrong missed some easy throws and his WR dropped a number of easy catches.

UVA's offense has a tendency to stop itself.
222 yds, 3 pts against Illinois
513 yds, 16 pts against Old Dominion
287 yds, 20 pts against Syracuse
295 yds, 17 pts against Duke
313 yds, 17 pts against L'ville
414 yds, 16 pts against GT

They just look like a team that is going to score around 17 ppg.

On offense, most of our groups are sort of a mess.
The OC doesn't seem to have a firm grasp how to use our RB's and the RB room is weaker than last year.
According to our participation sheet we played 7 OL last night, 2 of which are walk-ons. 2 of our transfer OL didn't play and neither did most of our recruited OL (Williams, Franklin and Vaipulu were the only recruited OL that played according to the participation chart).
Our QB room is much weaker than last season.
Our WR room is at best equivalent to last season, might be worse.

Our offensive talent level simply does not look high to me - below avg P5 level. Our OL looks almost like a complete whiff on recruiting and developing personnel.
At this point I actually question the talent level of the program and I question even more how good the staff was at evaluating recruits. In that Athlon pre-season article one opposing coach said they felt alot of the players GT recruited were overrated and you watch this team play and I can see why they might think that.

 

[jgtengineer]

My question is how bad is the other 4* QB on our roster (Taisun Phommachonh) if he didn't even get a shot?

He's recovering from an Achilles Injury IIRC he may be healthy but not 100 percent that injury takes 2 years.

 

[WreckinGT]

So almost exactly 1 year ago Dabo benched Uglylaylay for Taisun with 11:30 left in the 3rd quarter in the Pitt game while down 21-7, yet he's a developmental player and Dabo did not another QB to play, just Taisun?

After Taisun they had two 2 star QBs who were originally walk ons. Their QB room last year was worse than ours this year.

 

[GT33]

After Taisun they had two 2 star QBs who were originally walk ons. Their QB room last year was worse than ours this year.

The knock on Taisun was he wasn't elite by Clemson standards. We're saying he's awful, worse than what we saw last night. Call me skeptical. We keep our best RB on the bench, ran off a somewhat capable back up with a starting QB that never makes it thru a full season because when he played Clemson, ND and the fleabags he got massacred, have 3 DL starting on other high level programs. It's not like our staff has shown any type of evaluating expertise or retaining people that should be retained.

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[stech81]

They are beatable, but I am not sure we can score enough to keep up with UNC and Miami's defense is pretty stout.

Can't talk about Miami cause have not seen them play this year but UNC has no defense. FSU has dropped 3 in a row but without Sims I would put us at less than 5%

 

[alagold]

I wrote a comment before game about a true "coaching" test for Key to see if the break could clean up some problems.Obviously they didn't step forward.With NO capable QB your Offense will suck and it did.But the goal is to win the game and he didn't. Time to go back to the candidate list.