Ok so I apologize for being MIA for so long. Worst. Blogger. Ever. I know. The Monday night game threw off the schedule. Didn’t get a chance to review VT like I wanted. Had a wedding this past weekend (seriously, we are still doing fall weddings?) And I figured nobody needed analysis of Presbyterian. I guess it was good to see the season average stat padding 700 yards again, but I think we all knew how that game was going to go.
On to VT. After I got over the initial, crushing disappointment (and this took a few days) there actually were some positives. I was proud of the way we fought. I thought Tevin played a very good game until the decision at the end. (Of course, he said he was trying to throw it away, so maybe even that was not really his fault, as he was getting hit when he threw). Of course I was proud of the defense. Great game from them for most of the night. The special teams generally played well, good kickoff coverage, made the field goal, downed a punt deep, capitalized on VT’s awful punt snap.
But we lost. What is about GT? How do we find ways to lose games in the most gut wrenching manner? 44 seconds. Seriously. As soon as we scored and I saw the clock all I could think was “oh thats way too much time”. I mean, I knew the defense had played well. And 44 seconds is not much. But I just couldn’t shake that feeling. Even so we were still basically one tackle away. Even if they get the first down on 4th and 4, we probably win the game if our secondary makes the tackle the first time. But we went for the big hit. The only bad result there is to let him get cleanly past the first defender. The smart play would have been to wait, and move horizontally to stay in front. Doesn’t matter if he runs you over and gets an extra 2-3 yards by falling forward. Doesn’t even matter if the first guy does not make the tackle. We had plenty of guys in the area, coming to help. Just slow him down. But, we go for the big hit, and miss ever so slightly. But that was enough. The momentum took the first defender out of the play, and 15 yards down field VT is in comfortable FG range. Of course we still had a chance in overtime I guess.
But enough rehashing. It was a sloppy game. Looked like the first game for both teams, which it of course was. Both sides made a lot of mistakes and either side could have won comfortably had they been a little more sharp. But looking at the big picture, going into Blacksburg, with that many defensive starters returning for VT, and being essentially 1 play from winning and losing in OT is not terrible. Terribly painful yes, but there are worse losses. If our guys fight that hard and play that kind of defense and special teams all year, I think we will all be pretty happy with this team.
The Offense
I’m trying not to be too worried about the offense, but I’ve seen some things that concern me. VT’s defense is supposed to be loaded. So maybe its not a problem. But we were not sharp and did not look good running our base stuff. And we were not exactly overwhelming against PC early either. I know we gained 700 yards and scored 59 points eventually, but we were stuffed on 2 of our first 3 possessions. Did not look very good executing. Most of our success appeared to me to be simply from overwhelming physical talent. Presbyterian just could not match up with us. That won’t work against the rest of our schedule. We need to be able to execute.
I thought the QB’s have played pretty well. As I said Tevin had a good game against VT. Particularly the last drive to put us ahead. He showed a lot of guts and made some very tough plays. I did not like Days’ fumble against PC, but Vad Lee looked great. I was surprised by his speed. I would not call it breakaway speed, but he was about as fast as PC’s secondary. That should make him faster than, for example, most linebackers we will face. As advertised, he appears to be a great passer. I hope to see him continue to get reps. We may be onto something here.
The offensive line has not been as good as I had hoped. Don’t get me wrong, its been good. It may still in fact be “the best line since Paul Johnson was hired”, which is what its supposed to be. But I was hoping it would do better. I was hoping we would have more success against VT, and certainly that we would come out and manhandle PC. Neither happened. In both cases, the blocking by the skill position players may have been more to blame. But nevertheless, the O-Line has not been as good as I wanted. I would call it either “pretty good” or “good”, depending on how good VT’s defensive front ends up being. I was hoping for great. Maybe they will come around.
The A-backs have some significant ability to run the ball. I’m excited about that. However, I am a little concerned about the blocking. We definitely do not have anybody that blocks as well as Roddy did, at least not right now. I would even say we don’t have anybody that blocks as well as Peeples, except Orwin (who has been hurt for much of the first 2 games) and maybe Godhigh. The A-backs have probably been the best blockers out of the skill positions to this point, but thats more indicative of problems elsewhere than of the A-backs doing anything good. This needs to improve.
The B-backs have largely disappointed me to this point. Laskey has probably been the best at the fundamentals of the position, although I continue to believe Sims is the best runner and athlete of the bunch. Perkins is just a mystery. Not sure when or if things are going to click for him. Hope they do because I was very high on him based on his high school film. I hope Snoddy lives up to his potential because it would be great to have a home run hitter there again. Anyway, the running for the most part has been ok but not spectacular. None have really blocked all that well.
The WR’s have been the biggest concern for me, unquestionably. There was some questionable route running at VT, including at least one example of a WR quitting on his route when he might have had a big play if he runs it out 100%. But the main issue definitely has been blocking. We have always had good blockers out there. Thomas was excellent. Hill and Melton were very good. Those guys contributed greatly to our success running the ball. I have not seen anybody in this group so far who is even adequate. We left significant yards on the field at VT because of poor blocking on the outside. Its a big part of our offense, and often is necessary to open up a defense that is concentrating on clogging the middle. This is an area of significant concern for me moving forward.
Defense
Overall I’m pretty excited about the defense. Very good showing at VT. VT’s offense was far from sharp, but still a lot of that was caused by us. And outside of a couple of isolated breakdowns, it could have been a GREAT game for the defense. Plus I thought we were a little unlucky on what was a very weak personal foul penalty to get VT out of 3rd and 12 (sound familiar? sigh). And while its hard to tell much from the Presbyterian game, we did hold them to virtually nothing early on. They gained a total of 4 yards and 1 first down on their first 5 possessions. That is dominant. We did not do nearly that well against Western Carolina last year for example. I think PC had something like 90 total yards through its first 10 possessions.
The D-Line has pleased me to this point. I was concerned that we lost 2 out of 3 starters, but I was optimistic about our young depth there. And so far, it looks like I had reason to be. They are not perfect, but they did prevent VT’s O-Line from getting much push. And they were able to generate some pressure on their own. One factor that should not be overlooked is the height. We have several guys in the 6’6 or 6’7 range, and that height can really bother the QB if they get anywhere near him. This happened quite a few times to Logan Thomas. A lot of arms raised bothering a lot of throwing lanes and vision. This is not a dominant group, but it is improved and its good enough for us to have a good defense.
The linebackers have been very strong. I don’t want to get carried away because its early, but I’m very excited by this group. They can move. I mean serious speed. And they are better at moving with a purpose and understanding what they are supposed to be doing. In short, I think Groh’s prediction that year 3 is when the scheme clicks may turn out to be exactly right. But unquestionably, this group is athletic. Maybe the most athletic we’ve had in a while.
The secondary is talented, and could be quite good. For the most part they have played well, but did have several unfortunate breakdowns against VT. Obviously the long TD pass and the last drive, specifically the last play, of regulation. But there were others. We have less experience at safety than I’d like, which was a direct cause of the first TD. But overall the secondary has played well and has the ability to play even better.
I’m pretty psyched about the defense. I suspect this group might be able to really clamp down on UVA this weekend. That’s all I will say until the preview, but I’m optimistic that the defense might be back. The special teams have looked more sound as well. I hope the offense is not what ends up holding us back. That would be some frustrating irony.
Anyway, I will get a UVA preview up sometime this week. Tough loss to start the season but this team still has a lot to play for, and it may just surprise some people. The last time we had a good defense and an offense that struggled early was 2008. That was a pretty good year.
Let’s Go Jackets!
No comments:
Post a Comment