Banker's Defense in Review

ColoradoHusk

ColoradoHusk

Heisman Trophy Winner
I have seen a lot of posts from people giving A LOT of credit to Mark Banker for making adjustments and improving the D. Yes, the Blackshirts did play well against Rutgers and Iowa, to me, 2 games isn't a trend. If it is, why did it take 10 games for Banker to finally make necessary adjustments with this defense.

Below is a chart (sorry for the formatting, I guess it's impossible to paste a picture in from Excel) that shows the points and yards given up by opponent this year. It also shows the average PPG and YPG for that opponent and their national ranking. The season started out like a dumpster fire against BYU, Miami, and So Miss, when NU played the best offenses it would face all year. Even when NU got into conference play, teams didn't have much of a problem moving the ball on NU. I can give credit to Banker for allowing fewer points than the yards would imply, but the defense constantly came up short this year. I guess it shouldn't be a surprise, given the team's record. The big thing to take out of this is how bad the Big Ten West offenses are. Wow!!!

Points Avg. Points Ranking Yards Avg. Yards Ranking

BYU 33 34.2 39 511 428 46

S. Alabama 9 24.8 95 332 360 102

Miami 36 28.9 65 511 401 65

So Miss 28 41.7 9 458 535 8

Illinois 14 22.7 102 382 373 89

Wisconsin 23 27.1 80 469 377 82

Minnesota 25 22.6 103 366 357 103

Northwestern 30 20.7 111 333 333 115

Purdue 55 25.1 93 457 369 94

Michigan State 38 33.4 44 491 399 68

Rutgers 14 27.1 80 259 377 83

Iowa 28 33.7 41 250 404 63

Total 27.8 401.6

 
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I guess it's impossible to format copy and paste items. Screw you guys!!!

Long story short, the D sucked for most of the year.

 
Thanks for the information ColoradoHusk. I fear that this defense is over achieving. IMO, we have two great DTs. Bo looked like a genius with Suh and Crick playing. What happens when VV and MC are gone? I am worried.

 
Don't think it's coincidence that Rutgers/Iowa were our two best defensive showings, and they were the two healthiest games we've been all season depth-wise.

Factor in how many short fields and points were the direct result of turnovers (cough Purdue game) and the outcome is not nearly that bleak. He's no 2004-2007 Pelini, but he's also far from 2007 Cosgrove.

 
Bankers defenses have always been pretty good verses pro style offenses with immobile quarterbacks. The problems usually arise against dual threat qb's and spread systems. I'm fairly sure the games that Bankers defense has played well in this year are due more to a good match up than improving defense.

 
What we need is the ability to get off the field when we need to. The defense did it against Iowa. Against Northwestern, not so much. As long as the defense makes the necessary stops it's good.

 
hskrfan4life said:
What we need is the ability to get off the field when we need to. The defense did it against Iowa. Against Northwestern, not so much. As long as the defense makes the necessary stops it's good.
Click to expand...
Except it didn't against Iowa. NU scores a TD and gets within 4, and it took one play for Iowa to score. I know Gerry was out, but come on, make one stop to get the ball back to the offense.
 
ColoradoHusk said:
hskrfan4life said:
What we need is the ability to get off the field when we need to. The defense did it against Iowa. Against Northwestern, not so much. As long as the defense makes the necessary stops it's good.
Click to expand...
Except it didn't against Iowa. NU scores a TD and gets within 4, and it took one play for Iowa to score. I know Gerry was out, but come on, make one stop to get the ball back to the offense.
Click to expand...


Why would you only look at one possession the entire game? It's going to be pretty hard to ever find a defense that doesn't at least give up A score in a football game.

Our defense did everything it needed to do in the 4th quarter for us to be in a great position to win.

 
I think our run D is more sound. The two gashing iowa runs notwithstanding

 
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