flatwaterfan

We didn't get a lot of pressure on the QB in this game. That makes it tough for the DB's.

BK is big in the running game. He knows the offense. He just has to work on focus, use his body better to screen the defender and be stronger with his hands. Have a little more 'THIS IS MY BALL!" attitude. I think he will come around. I think they might want to try and put less pressure on him to be the main man and spread it out a bit more. That might help.

This is a common belief on this board and I can't figure out why. Taylor has rolled out several times over the last year-plus and he's been reasonably accurate doing it. I am not necessarily in agreement. I think he has had mixed results. It depends which direction he is rolling and if he has his shoulders square to the LOS and what foot he is throwing off of.

do people actually think this will happen? I have more faith in our coaches. We have a new OC, a new offense, and a lot of youth. And not having dennard is huge. I think our line in particular will get better Oh I agree with you. I think we will improve. We need to avoid injuries at certain spots.

Boy, I do not enjoy reading that quote. Thing is though, he's right. Is that a function of a bad night for the D-line, or is it indicative of poor LB play? Maybe both. I couldn't stop thinking about Wisconsin as I watched Fresno rack up close to five YPR. If we don't make some improvements in that area, I get the feeling I'm not going to enjoy my experience in Madison. At all. IMO his quote is a little misleading. There were a lot of things. They trapped us a few times and we over pursued a few times. We slanted our line a few times and we didn't have any backside run support. Our DLINE didn't play their gaps very well. They also did an excellent job of cross blocking and blocking down. They got good blocking angles. I wouldn't say that we got overpowered. I think they were well coached and we didn't play assignment football with good technique. I agree that there is concern if we keep doing this. Wisconsin, Northwestern etc will all have a field day if they don't play their assignments.

On review of the game our DL did a poor job of playing their gaps. Compton ended up covering WR's a few time which is one reason he looked slow. Some of this was because we didnt get a good rush and some is because their coaching staff did a good job of exploiting some match ups. I am impressed with Fresno's coaching staff. We got trapped a few times on the dline, we didn't hold containment a few times and we over pursued a few times. They did a lot of cross blocking and did a good job with that. They were well coached. We also got held a few times. (Crick got tackled) I actually think our offense played better than the D. We weren't really that far away from having more good plays. I really like Thompsen as an Hback. That's a good personnel group for us and we had some positive yardage with that. That was a counter that worked and they could of run more. I would say that some of the problems last night were due to Tmart. Like on the option he's got to be patient and let Legate get out front. Still the option was a good play more times than not. They also ran 1 bunch formation/screen that looked good. It's clear they are limiting the playbook right now. We could of scored on the option pass if we wanted or ran some reverses as they had their safeties fully committed to the run game. I have to think we are holding back. The replay booth sucked. Calling the fresno TD on that replay angle was bogus. That's not clear evidence due to parallax. You can't make that call to overturn. Cripes. The spot on Tmart's fumble should of been a first down. We should not have been called for delay of game. They wound the clock and we had an injured player walking on the field to the locker room. The clock should not have been running. I think they wound the clock a few times to early for both sides.

+1

Over reacting is our job. chuckleshuffle I do agree that as fans we can be hyper critical and I agree that FSU deserves credit. I also would say sometimes we are critical of players and incorrectly fail to recognize those players may be the best option we have so why are we criticizing the best option we have? It's not their fault they are in that position. It is what it is. A lot of this is just venting and worry about the future and because people want to be heard. It really doesn't mean much. We are back set driving arm chair quarterbacks. Where's my beer. People always overreact to the unknown. We have to improve whether we can is UNKOWN. I am definitely guilty of all of the above.

I am extremely jealous!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! There were some busts in the secondary. Most concerning were guys getting behind us. I think Compton did okay. His foot may be slowing him a little? Fischer missed some tackles. Our DL was inconsistent at times but they did occupy the line which frees up the LB's. When our LB's do get engaged, they are fast and able to come off blocks, but unfortunately they are not strong and are getting a lot of tackles in pursuit where they are behind the runner as in getting pushed back or they are in pursuit as the runner is in the 2nd level. Our LB's are not always meeting the backs in the holes all the time. We are having trouble covering backs out of the backfield in the passing game still. Stafford is really good in run support. He's still learning coverage. I think he did start and played most of the game. He needs to be out there. Blatchford is playing the nickel. He doesn't make mistakes but he is not the fastest. FSU did a good job of exploiting the speed difference between the slot receiver and the nickel. We need to get more speed at that spot. Thorell made a decent play one time but I am not sure if he was dime or nickel. This is just my opinion. I am just a casual fan so take it with a grain of salt. Our blitzing was ineffective AND that is a big concern.

I don't claim to have good answers I will give you my opinion though. 1) We are a grab bag offense - multiple. I think they have tried to take plays from different offensive philosophies that give teams problems and put them into an offense where the plays can work off each other. These plays are similar in nature in that they are not fundamentally different in how you execute them/block them so from the stand point of formation you are diverse but you use the same concepts to block. It's somewhat similar to last year but you are seeing less timing routes and a less emphasis on the spread read option with the one back. You are seeing pistol, 2 back, diamond etc. I think they want to run more power, but the problem is that we don't have the personnel/development to get there yet. This will have to be an evolution. 2) They want to be able to control tempo whether it be fast or so. It depends on how they are doing and the opponent. We had a lot of 3-outs so you don't want to go up-tempo if your getting stuffed all the time. In fact you can't develop any tempo at all... I thought our defense looked tired at times. FSU developed tempo because they had long drives. We are a big play, feast or famine offense right now. Hard to develop tempo with that. 3) Lots of other threads on this. Scheme wise I was surprised not to see diamond formation. Playing calling I think they are opening up the play book a little but need to go further. We saw some effective play action. We still haven't seen many counters or boots or mis direction. Haven't seen many rollouts. Execution. The good is not many penalties, not to many sacks. They still are learning how to run option. There were a couple of passes that should of been caught. They did not control the LOS. Not sure if that's a physical thing or an execution thing. Probably both. Some of it may be WANT TO. We scored a significant number of points with some big plays. That suggests some good execution. We got stuffed a number of times and didnt have any drives with lots of plays. That's suggests poor execution. Maybe we should call it the Jeckyll Hyde offense.

Yes I was surprised as well. We didn't see any diamond or much 2 back. Obviously the game plan dictated this because of what Fresno State does. What that is I don't know. Maybe someone with more knowledge can fill us in.

BK is a good leader. I think he has a bit of a mental thing going on now though. I think the coaches can do him a favor by featuring him a bit less until he gets his confidence back. They need to spread it around.

He did a great job in the 2nd half.

I agree as well. It's a long season and they should be able to improve. I have to give credit to Fresno State. Great coaching. Their team has a lot of heart. Hope they win their league.

If we don't improve we will lose 5-6 games. Hopefully they will get better each week. They miss FONZO bigtime. I think this defense will be better when Evans can play the nickel and as some of our newer guys on D get seasoned. Would like to see Smith and Stafford at the safeties as we need more speed there too. What would we ever do if David got hurt. That would be devastating. I am hoping the offense gets better as they open up the playbook more and get more reps as the season goes along. Can't believe we didn't see more of the freshmen backs. I hope they don't pull another Arod on us. Those guys need to get some snaps. Would also like to see more Bell, Turner & Enunwa.

Defensively: Negatives We didn't defend rollouts very well We don't cover the backs well in the passing game We need to get more speed at the nickel Our safety got beat deep a couple of times and we had some busted coverages. Dline was inconsistent. Positives. Played a little better in the 2nd half. David had a good game Green is settling in. Offensively: Negatives Not much yardage from our Ibacks. I dont think Heard or Green saw any time. Oline still has a long way to go. Still looking for them to open up the playbook a bit TMart runs too upright and is going to get knocked into next Wednesday. Needs to secure the ball. 1 of our WR needs to concentrate on catching the ball. Positives. Play action resulted in big plays. Not a lot of penalties. Speed kills Special teams: Negatives: Our bullets were overrunning on coverage. Their bullets were beating us down the field. We did a terrible job of jamming. Postives: Maher had a few good directional punts. Snapping & Ball handling/fielding all good. Blocking good. Only 1 punt that was not so good (low and outkicked coverage) Coverage got better as game went along. Return guys are making first guy miss

Man was I clueless on how this game would go. Could thing I don't live in Vegas.

Nebraska getting exposed a bit on D. They don't cover the backs out of the backfield very well and aren't defending the rollouts very well. Still I think they can get that fixed. Offense, yikes.

Sounds like they get after the QB and are good at sacks. My guess is that screens and play action will be big in this game. I look for a lot of big plays. I expect the run game to be about the same. Maybe some more diamond formation.

NU-42 Fresno- 0 Rushing 286 Passing 155

Lots of family pictures. Nice painting by his daughter. I liked that. I like those sort of things. A few mementos. Some stacks of work. Looks like a typical office. Looks like he has adequate space. Not too fancy but fairly nice.

I wonder how contentious the big 12-2 meetings would be with a member that didn't want to be there. Regardless I think the league is toast. Your not hearing anything from UT which means there shopping around again. Really like the OWH piece with Harvey today. What I really liked was Harvey getting it on the public record again that when Nebraska left it didn't harm the conference and they were actually able to make a better deal. Big 12 said that when they made the deal too. That's further protection from litigation. The bit about the big 12 conference giving permission and then claiming that individual schools didn't give permission is bogus in my opinion. I am so glad to be away from Texas politics.

Personally, I wouldn't compare Tmart as a soph to the Crouch/Tommy sophomore years. Both Crouch and Tommy ran option orientated offenses in High School. Then they both got to practice option football their freshmen year/redshirt freshmen years. They had the benefit of an experienced offensive staff that knew that stuff inside out. The lineman & fullbacks & TE's were all well versed in option football some of those guys had 5 years experience. Even with all that experience sometimes the offense would look bad in bowl games because their timing would be off due to rust. This team is coming off of WCO & Spread offenses the past 2 years. The team has had 1 spring and fall camp to learn new principals. Everyone is learning include the QB. You can't compare back.

Good article. I like it.

I formulated a few other thoughts on the 3rd review. Not sure if they are good or not but here they are.... 1) I am glad Tmart is scrambling if no one is open, but he needs to hang for 3 seconds. There were a few times he flushed at the count of 1/ quick 2. Hanging in the pocket to a count of 3 will open up the field a bit more so if he has to scramble and gives his receivers time to run their routes. It looked like the pocket was fine. 2) Follow your fullback. Use your blockers. If he ducks up get on his outside hip. 3) Fullback was getting awful wide on those options. Looks like he could of taken on the next defender but instead went on to the corner. 4) Time to put this game in the old bit bucket. It's hashed out.