1) The worst thing that could have happened, happened. The offense was mixing it up a little bit with different looks and sets and using Gray. Then Gray fumbled after a nice pick up of 8 yards on 1st down—and that was the end of all that. It was boring after that happened.

2) We were shredded by Air Force’s run game? Really? At first glance, I would agree with you—they gained 261 yards on the ground. But when you take into consideration that was on 66 carries it isn’t so bad. 4.0 yards per carry certainly isn’t stuffing them, but they did contain them. 13 points allowed (really only 10 since 3 points were off of the aforementioned Gray fumble around our own 30) against a team that averaged twice that amount last year is pretty decent. I don’t know that I would say this is a sign of the apocalypse.

3) Jahvid Best may actually be easier to defend than Air Force’s rushers. Why? Because we only have to worry about one guy instead of 3-4. Kafka absolutely shredded us last year, but only because he couldn’t find any open receivers and running was his only option. Yesterday he had 5 rushes for 21 yards. He had 6 for 6 against Towson. Having him run isn’t really part of Northwestern’s game plan.

4.) Our offense does need to improve for the Big 10. Weber nearly got Decker killed by the Air Force secondary on a few throws by putting him in vulnerable positions. Stoudermire and Green seem to be out there a lot, so hopefully he starts finding a rhythm with someone else at some point.

5.) Collado made some nice plays out there, but every time he gets burned everyone is going to remember that.

1 – Rencito is right, the offense starts creative, something goes wrong then they go ultra conservative and boring. Still finding the groove I guess, better find it next week real early.

2 – shredded is the wrong word. Navy ran for 4.2 on OSU last week, Notre Dame 5.1 against Mich, Georgia Tech averaged 6.1 against Clemson. 4.0 is not shredded by any means. They were 3rd and short all day long, they always needed 3 plays to get 10. We had trouble stopping them in 3rd and short but this is a difficult running game to defend. Once again the defense adjusted and it was

3 – yes they are. Best is a Heisman candidate, he’ll be tough to stop but every team he faces will have to gamplan for him. I’m comfortable with our run defense, the pass defense is more suspect (imo), especially if Sherels isn’t healthy.

4 – clearly he needs to find other receivers when they are open. But it’s not like the Big Ten didn’t know about Decker last year and they still racked up good numbers against better defenses. Like last week, Weber found more receivers later in the game when it mattered most. But the offense has to be better all around for 4 quarters.

5 – I agree that we’ll be much better with our starting corner in there. Collado is a weak link and there is a reason he isn’t starting. But he’s the third corner and there is a reason he is playing ahead of Carter. He isn’t as bad as you are making him out to be, he had his receiver covered well on a pass into the end zone on that 4th qtr FG drive by AFA. Nothing special but he did his job.

Next week:

Cal pounds us 34-10.
Akron beats Indiana.
Syracuse beats Northwestern.
The Big 10 takes another beating from the media.

As an aside, I think it is complete BS that MIchigan is ranked because they beat Notre Dame…even though they will win again next week over Eastern Michigan. The Wolverines will be a decent team this year, but they don’t deserve to be ranked yet. There is an incredible amount of bias in the human polls. The BCS should be entirely based on computers, or at least much more than it is now.

they thought we’d get up to 5 commits this weekend, but no predictions or actual verbals that I had heard.

While I certainly am not expecting a win next weekend, I think we’ll be able to make it a little bit more of a game than people expect. Air Force got a lot of yards due to an exhibition on how to cut block on the perimeter. I don’t think Cal will be doing the same thing (note: I haven’t seen Cal play, I just assume that it’s not part of their game) and our tremendous linebacking corps will have another outstanding week.

I’m watching the BTN replay of the game. AFA’s first drive of the 2nd half they drove down to inside the 10. On 4th and 1 they decided to go for it. They pitched it left. Collado got there and made all the difference as he strung out the play, took on the blocker and then Triplett made a great tackle to stop them on 4th down. Had AFA scored momentum in the second half may have been COMPLETELY different.