What went right and what went wrong
by GopherNation on Sep 8, 2009 11:00 AM CDT
in Gopher Football
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PrintI think this will become a weekly post here following Gopher games. The intent will be to quickly talk about what went right/wrong and then transition into what this means for next week's game.
What went right?
We won. The fact that we won is getting lost in all of this. It wasn't pretty and a longtime season ticket-holder I was talking with summed it well saying, "it wasn't inspiring." But the fact is we don't know how good we are, we don't know how good Syracuse is and I think we had some odd expectations on this team before we ever kicked off week 1. First of all let's slow down with the notion that Syracuse is terrible and we are just superior and we should have dominated. I know they are going through a coaching change and had 3 wins last year. But they are talented and their 2008 record is a bit deceiving (kind of like our 2007 record was a bit deceiving). It is way too early to be passing judgement on our opponents or on us.
The defense did their job. Great halftime adjustments. In the first half Syracuse scored 20 points and accumulated 170 yards. The second half they did not score and racked up just 58 yards, including OT (I know the 228 does not equal the 257 in the stats, I took my numbers from the drive chart summaries since I can't find stats split out by halves. You get the idea). The Orange was held to less than 100 yards rushing and only 167 yards passing. Great job keeping us in the game when the offense was struggling.
What went wrong?
The offense was out of rhythm and stagnant for most of the game. This was a combination of playcalling that never got into a rhythm and Weber's inaccuracy when throwing to open receivers. There can be a list of excuses. Fisch has never done this before and is learning, the offensive line was better than last year but still struggled, the defenses are just ahead of offenses at this point, Syracuse was blitzing often and kept us from doing what we wanted to do. Whatever the excuse, it needs to be corrected and soon. It was the first game of the year and most of us are not expecting perfection (notice I said most of us), but that was ugly for the first three quarters. Forget the schedule and forget our opponents, offense is supposed to be a strength of ours and we struggled more than we should have.
Where was the run game? After an entire offseason of stressing power running and talk of establishing the run, the run game was effective but not used. A prime example of this was the last play of the 1st quarter and the beginning of the 2nd.
- 1st down - Bennett 9 yard rush
- 2nd down - Hoese 10 yard rush
At this point why abandon the run? ESTABLISH the run, run it until they stop it. Instead?
- 1st down - incomplete pass
- 2nd down - rush for 2 yd loss
- 3rd down - incomplete pass
The first quarter was another example
- 1st and goal at the 5 - Bennett 3 yd rush
- 2nd and goal at the 2 - incomplete pass
- 3rd and goal - penalty
- 3rd and goal at the 7 - Weber to Stoudermire for a TD
I know we got the TD, but 2nd and goal at the 2. A team with a power rushing attitude would run the ball. Bennett had a 4.9 per carry average yet he had 16 carries. Get him the ball and let him establish the run or go back to the spread, at least with that offense we had an identity.
Finally, the penalties. 10 penalties is just plain too many. We struggled with this last year and it seems to be a recurring problem. Just plain needs to stop.
Looking Ahead
Air Force scored 72 points and racked up 474 yard rushing. I know it was an FCS team but 72 points is hard to do regardless of your opponent. Assuming our defense, especially linebackers, are disciplined I think we'll be OK against the run. But they will exploit us if we get out of position or overpursue, we will get killed on the ground. Offensively it will be a totally different look, but it doesn't matter they just plain have to execute better at all levels. This is a home game and we should be expected to win but please avoid the trap that we are a vastly superior team. I'm not sure we are. We are better and we should win but if we don't clean some things up and get an identity on offense we could be in for a long evening at TCF this weekend.
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Very good post.
The issue at the front of my mind is this:
At the end of last year, Brewster decided that his team wasn’t running well enough. He decided to dump the spread offense, fire his O-line coach and (effectively) Dunbar, and bring in Davis and Fisch. He revamped the offensive philosophy before his third year in the program, thereby, in effect, starting over. In came big, plodding O-linemen, and a pro-set offense.
The issue: the O-line was heavily banged up last year, and Bennett was out. The rushing game, I presume, stunk because of personnel, not because of scheme. This scheme change was a drastic one to make – was it made to be more attractive to a recruit like Seantrel Henderson?
The change reeked of desperation to me when it happened – readers here know that. I like it less after watching week 1. There are only 3 or 4 guys with legitimate speed and playmaking ability on the offense – Decker, Stoudermire, Bennett and Whaley if used. Adam Weber’s playmaking has been effectively neutered by not running from the backfield. MarQueis Gray was not even used (maybe we’re saving him) and he’s now in an offense he wasn’t recruited for. And where the heck were Hayo Carpenter, Bryant Allen and especially David Pittman?
The idea that you need to get a bunch of fatties on the line to be a power rushing team is ridiculous. West Virginia ranked top 10 in rushing from 2004-07. Michigan rushed for 250 yards on Saturday with five Lloyd Carr recruits in the starting lineup, but were running the spread option offense.
The reason why the SEC / Big 12 teams regularly beat up on the Big Ten is because of the speed of their line play. Minnesota has surrendered that argument this year – Jeff Wills was speed rushed on numerous occasions on Saturday, on which one Weber was sacked and fumbled (also, why did Wills need TE help on the first Bennett rushing play, he’s 375 pounds?). Also, there was a screen pass play in the first half where Bennett dropped the ball. However, he would have been killed, because Wills and Carufel were both 3-5 yards BEHIND Bennett at the time of the drop. The athleticism, in my opinion, has dropped on the offensive side of the ball. We’ll see what the Air Force Academy does in response to it – I still think we’ll win, but I really dislike what I’ve seen so far.
Just one game...
Like I said in a previous comment on another post, you can’t make a bunch of judgments based on one data point. I think we played pretty terribly on offense and it can only get better as the season goes. Weber hasn’t been that God awful before. Last year we struggled because Weber had no time to look to his 2nd/3rd options. Last weekend, he just couldn’t throw the ball on target.
Even with big fatties on the line, you still need to be able to run by them or its going to be two yards and a cloud of dust every time. So I don’t think we are going to have a ton of success running between the tackles this year. Our best bet is to let Bennett run outside the tackles and catch passes in the flat and giving the ball every once in a while to Eskeridge or Whaley up the middle to keep the defense honest.
Air Force will be a test. A Big 10 team needs to be able to stop the run and it will be a good measure of how good we really are at linebacker. I don’t know why we wouldn’t put 9 guys in the box and dare them to throw. Obviously, Nicholls St couldn’t stop the run so they didn’t have to throw. I would put our linebackers/d-backs against their receivers. Don’t just dare them to throw the ball—make them throw the ball. If we do that, we will be alright on Saturday.
Wow, I can’t wait to see the stadium on TV. For once, the story line will be about us. I’m sure they will show a lot of old (painful) footage from the Metrodome as well as some from Memorial Stadium throughout the game. Unfortunately, ESPN gets so wrapped up in its storylines and in-game previews of other things showing on ESPN that we will miss out on half the game as usual. I swear they spend half the time not talking about the game we are supposed to be watching.
Air Force Concerns
1—-returning starting QB (key position in wishbone) from last year
2—8-5 record last year and that included a heartbreaking bowl loss
3—they played Utah tough in a loss (23-20) last year (the same Utah that destroyed bama)
4—our D-line looked OK but lacks any speed which may really be noticable agst the wishbone
5—it is quite possible some of these guys have never played against this type of offense or anything close to it in their entire careers—-
Question
We lost the Time of Possession stat to the Orange. My question is, I wonder when was the last game we actually won the TOP battle?? I am having a hard time recalling the last time I saw the Gophers put together a good old-fashioned time-consuming drive. Nothing could help the D more than keeping them off the field.
You're not going to believe this
Texas Gopher, but according to the U of MN website, in 2008 the splits on time of possession for the SEASON was:
30:00 for the Gophers, 30:00 for the opponents.
That’s amazing. Looking back.
Bowl game v. Kansas – we had 29:54, they had 30:06.
Iowa – 22:23 we had, 37:37 they had (Yoda)
Wisconsin – 23:14, 36:46
Michigan – 34:13, 25:47.
Northwestern – DING DING DING!! We had 33:08 to NW’s 26:52. We must have won that game!!!
JG2112
thanks for the feedback and will respond later.
Good work, GN.
Looks good. The only other thing that immediately jumps out at me as a big “WRONG” was game management. We iced our own kicker! There were also a few other instances where I was looking at my TV wondering if I saw what I saw.
by WhiteSpeedReceiver on Sep 8, 2009 2:55 PM CDT reply actions
Disagree JG
I’ve been watching football a long time (and I played a long time), and Saturday’s game showed me we have a lot more problems than solutions. I think you’re being too kind with your “it’s only on game, let’s not judge, we don’t know anything yet”. Weber, I agree, was out of character with how poor he played. I have never seen that. BUT…we won that game in overtime even though they spotted us 7 points at the start.
My concerns are now with coaching, not so much with players. The coaching changes year after year, the poor play calling (even in overtime), the perception that our players aren’t very smart “football players”. They rarely, since the Glen Mason era, seem to make wise choices on the field. The fact that we didn’t have the coaching to keep the ball in the middle of the field in OT was disturbing. The penalties also speaks to coaching. Our offensive line was very poor and it was never more clear than when we couldn’t get a yard on three plays when Weber was stopped on the sneak on 4th down. That’s just sad against a crappy Syracuse team (which you will see over the coming weeks, Syracuse is just a bad team). Weber for some reason has forgotten how to tuck the ball and run with it. Wasn’t he our leading rusher a couple years ago? Or one of them? The “playmakers” who are the future of the program either didn’t touch the ball, or didn’t touch the field. Are they not grasping the schemes yet? Are they struggling with the system? Why weren’t those guys flying around the field being given a chance to make plays when it was so apparent that Weber was struggling? Why no wildcat or slot use of Gray? Where’s Carpenter? Suddenly Brewster says “we’ll use those guys more this week”, and we’re supposed to be happy? Why the hell didn’t they get used this week when we nearly crapped the bed in Syracuse? We’ve been playing football (let’s be honest) since the spring.
So we open at TCF and we are favored by the Vegas Gods…maybe they know something I don’t. We’ve got 6 former roommates getting back together from all over the country for the game…we’re coming back to campus!!!
Are you going to post some “hot spots” to hit Friday and Saturday before/after the game? That would add value to those of us old guys who are going to be living the bachelor lifestyle that weekend! Cheers y’all…I post because I care…and I hated that Syracuse game. We got lucky, and to say different is kidding yourself. It was some good defense, and a lot of luck.
Wow.
Jimi – If you spend enough time around here, you’ll probably learn pretty quickly what I think of Tim Brewster as a football coach so far in Minnesota. As far as I’m concerned, he’s on the clock. Now. The Syracuse game only confirmed that for me. His coaching changes in the offseason reeked of “I don’t know what I’m doing” to me, or, “Maturi is demanding changes after 55-0, or I’m out the door in a year or two.”
Where are you going to be staying in Mpls (what general region?) I can tailor hotspots for you depending on where you are going to be (although Schiek’s and the Lamplighter are worth the cab fare no matter where you are in the Cities)….
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