Canadian Fan

You forgot to mention "not sideways"....

Just wanted to give Falk props for blocking all the way down field on the long Mills run.

So next series, Piper and Bernhart should be on bench with next guys getting the series.

It's not on the coaches if AM fumbles. It is totally on the coaches if they don't hold him accountable.

Okay.... If AM won't wrap up the ball into contact despite the fumbles, and I'm sure the coaching reminders, he needs to spend time on the bench.

Farniok totally whiffed on that block to blow up the run play....

There you go.....

So that's what a vertical pass looks like? Huh?

Damn AM, wrap up the ball with two hands and get low..... Mental mistake again.

And let's throw ball behind line again....that usually works for us.

Corcoran way down field on that block. Nice!

I have a hard time assessing offensive “talent” in isolation of the awful QB play and OC play calling. As I’ve said before, any OC who tries to make our OL block laterally is trying to jam a square peg in a round hole. Let them drive and trap and they’re decent. Ask them to go sideways and S&C has not built them to do that. They are far too heavy footed and the opposing DC knowing our preferences often calls hard slants which regularly blow our guys up. Then to add insult to injury, earlier in the season moreso then last couple of weeks, to NOT attempt to throw the ball deep and allowing 8 defenders to stack the box made those lateral run plays and behind the line passes more likely to create a loss than a gain. My last observation which lets the OC off the hook just a bit, is that I’m not sure if we had any games this year where our QB was better than the opposing QB. Game after game we saw opposing B1G QB’s come in and make key throws when they needed them, while ours struggled to hit passes many high school QB’s could hit regularly. At the end of the day, my takeaways are as follows: 1. I think we may need a new QB coach as our current one appears to be failing to develop the throwing motion, footwork and ability to read opposing defenses that are required to win at this level. 2. If after replacing that coach and our QB’s still can’t consistently hit the broad side of a barn, then the OC needs to re-jig the scheme to match what our QB’s can do well. 3. S&C needs to be aligned with the OC as well. If the team identity is going to be based on lateral running (which personally is not my favourite), then S&C need to have the OL doing more skipping and less squats. So outside of “getting better QB passing” which is kind of obvious, the largest part of the “talent” issue that we can go after is the lack of alignment between the talent we do have, the systems and plays the OC appears stubbornly committed to run, and the S&C crew that need to deliver the bodies to run those plays. So we can blame a lot of other individuals (coaches and players) for their smaller contributions, but this biggest issue falls on the team CEO and he needs to make it priority one heading into next season.

@desertshox I actually found a GREAT link. Not only did I get to watch in the game in HD, but I met several nice women thru these helpful pop up links that showed up during the game. :-D

@ColoradoHusk If you recorded the game, go back and rewatch. I'm pretty certain it was start of 2nd half where they kept panning between Lubick and Frost. If you rewatch that segment and you don't think Lubick was calling the plays (and Frost was monitoring the plays), you let me know. I think I wrote two or three posts in the game thread as it was happening as it appeared so obvious. For the record, to me that's not a slight against Frost at all. On the contrary, if he has handed off play calling to Lubick, I think that shows he's growing as a coach by being confident enough to give up the OC role to be more of a CEO.

@ColoradoHusk 1. Because the plays looked very different to the point they were out of character for Frost. 2. Because they showed the booth several times and unlike previous games, Lubick was very talkative. They would then pan down to Frost who appeared to be listening only and referring to his playsheet to see what was being called.

@Undone I don't think it was Frost calling that game.

Looks like a very big strong kid. Give him a couple of years and he could carry 320+ and be effective on either the DL or OL.

That doesn't sound good. How did he manage to that on his own fielding a punt in pre-game warm up? Was it just a bad unlucky step?

1. It appears that for whatever reason, Matt Lubick got his first opportunity to call some plays and appeared to do a damn good job at it. Here's hoping that continues. 2. Regardless of the improvement in the playcalling, it still doesn't work if individual players don't execute. So kudos first to Jurgens and AM who both had to play solid games, and they did. Others on the offense earning a shout out include Robinson, Jamies, Betts and Mills amongst others. 3. I know that bagging on Chin is kind of a sport around here, but given his talent I continue to think his unit has been the most consistent all season. Three areas of improvement: i) Stop the safety blitz from 20 yards away. If he wants to blitz your safety, he needs to cheat them up to the LOS, ii) The cushions on the WR's need to tighten up as they're just too big, iii) He needs to start pulling guys off the field when they dive at feet and don't wrap up. Missed tackles by individual players have regularly undone what the other 10 defenders on the field did right. It needs to stop. But hat tip to the whole unit. The way they stuffed the run today was a thing of beauty. 4. Kudos to the special teams today. There was obviously room for improvement, but the long field goal, the punt block, and the kick-offs were all things to build on going forward. All in all, good game. Super happy for the kids. They deserved a win and got one.

Much better to happen now than later....at least now we have a chance to try to find a replacement.

Pretty good day by the OL today. Hat tip to Jurgens who really cleaned up his snaps which was huge. I continue to believe that physically (and maybe psychologically) this OL is much better going forward between the tackles. As soon as we try to go out side the tackles and ask the kids to maintain blocks while moving laterally the odds of a bust or a holding call go up by at least 50%. So although I appreciate that we want to mix it up to keep the defenders honest, even if attacking the edge, I’d really see the OL be allowed to drive block while doing so to see how we do.

Huge props to AM..... Well done young man!!!

Nice throw Luke!!!!! Clutch!!!!

Chin has to stop blitzing the safeties from 20 yards away.....

The downside of man....if your defender takes a bad step and falls behind, it's a quick six points for your opponent. That being said, I'm not sure of your kids will get better if you don't let them make some of these mistakes (it was Reimer's guy on the TD).