Did UMass really hold our offense to 13 pts for 3 quarters?

[Brochacho]

Whitmer can throw. Amazing to watch a QB that can throw a ball 5 yards on target. I think his only issue right now is he is looking for either 1. His first option exclusively or 2. Trying to make the big play when its not their as opposed to taking the easy play. The way our offense works, he has to know there is nothing wrong with settling for a play that gets 5 or 6 yards.

 

[JayRU09]

He threw some nice short passes, but he had two long bombs that I saw that just looked bad and seemed to die mid air.

 

[jbdphi]

Not trolling but here's my observation:

Your defense is sick, let's see how it is against higher level competition, but so far so good.

Yards per carry should be worrying to you guys, mainly because......

Your receivers weren't getting separation, and Whitmer was throwing some ugly deep balls. If the OL can't run block and you can't stretch the field, then it may be a long season. But I feel good about your defense and getting Nick Williams the ball may be the best strategy going forwards.

All in all, hard to tell what your season will be like based off this game.

Completely agree with all of this - and I agree it isn't trolling - learn the difference guys. Obviously I'm very happy with the overall result but if there were two things I was worried about coming out of this game, it was the lack of separation our receivers were getting on deep routes and the push we were getting from our OL in the running game.

Lesser concern is McCummings and ball security. Whitmer I was relatively happy with. Tough to tell from watching TV whether he missed some open guys and threw into coverage but overall he showed a lot of promise for his first FBS game.

 

[jbdphi]

He threw some nice short passes, but he had two long bombs that I saw that just looked bad and seemed to die mid air.

Maybe it's just a matter of aesthetics? I didn't have a problem with the two deep throws he made. I had a problem that the receivers both times were well covered so no matter where you put the ball we weren't likely to get a completion.

 

[businesslawyer]

My only 2 call outs from last night were the OL not moving the UMass DL, and the timing of using the Wildcat. Always seemed to be after Whitmer completed a nice ball. Really wish they'd just let the kid get into a rhythm. Otherwise, very happy with how we played.

An easy win is an easy win, and it's always a mistake to look for negatives in a 37 point blowout. But if you want to look for them, the two you posted are by far #1 and #2, in your order, with 3 turnovers being third.

 

[UConnDan97]

If the UMass defender didn't whiff on the trick play catch by Griffin it may have only been 16 total points for the game.

As we all saw our OL could not move the UMass DL down the field like they should have. Pass blocking was OK but if we can't run on UMass.....?

I sure hope the intention was to keep the play calling so simple UMass was able to keep us from gaining yards on the ground.

Retire the wildcat. Never ever use it again. Whitmer looks nimble enough if you are looking for the option type play. I think PP is hooked on it though and it will never go away......unfortunately.

Geremy Davis....who knew?

You found a way to say everything that I was thinking last night. Well said. I'm obviously ecstatic that our defense took care of business and that the final score was a blowout-shutout, but you hit on everything that concerned me last night. That daggone wildcat....I have a feeling that Pasqualoni did it so much last night so that he can use that one down where he has McCummings throw the ball against NCState (as HFD alluded to). But my God, you are working this hard to set up exactly 1 trick play???

Let Whitmer play and stay in that rhythym. Let the receivers and the tight ends get comfortable with the new QB. And let Geremy Davis tear that $#it up!!!

 

[sportsart]

After watching the game again it was obvious PP was giving the OL time at different positions so there is no doubt that affected their performance.

By the way...there is no suck thing as a fluke turn over. But if there were I'd like to know what the second one was last night.

 

[Excalibur]

Look at it this way -- this game looked much like the Fordham game last year. Some negatives to call out, a few struggles on offense, but a dominant victory nonetheless (the final scores were similar). UMass may not be very good, but they are surely MUCH better than Fordham was last year.

 

[UConnDan97]

After watching the game again it was obvious PP was giving the OL time at different positions so there is no doubt that affected their performance.

By the way...there is no suck thing as a fluke turn over. But if there were I'd like to know what the second one was last night.

That's true. I saw a healthy dose of Cruz and some of Samra as well. I have to say that the best "guard-pulls" that I saw last night to open up holes for McCombs happened to be from Cruz, for what it's worth. We definitely worked on some different things, and you're right that it likely affected the overall production. Still.....the wildcat...

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

Before last night's game, if you had told me that the game would play out exactly like it did I would've signed for that in a heartbeat.

Yes, we had issues running the ball and the OL struggled in that regard.

Yes, we turned the ball over way too much for my liking. Against better teams we simply cannot do that.

Yes, I thought we ran way too much wildcat last night.

We won the game 37-0. Our defense and specials were lights out. I have to believe the offense will get better. There are certainly areas to improve upon, but last night went about as well as we could have reasonably expected.

My biggest concerns this morning are the health of Teddy Jennings and Casey Cochran's mustache.

 

[UConnDan97]

My biggest concerns this morning are the health of Teddy Jennings and Casey Cochran's mustache.

So true! Hopefully Teddy is okay. And that mustache....WOW! It screams "Apprentice pedophile."

 

[Brochacho]

Was it me or was Ryan Griffin only targeted twice? Griffin is the same size as Gronk, -10 pounds. Do work with him in the redzone.

 

[kcc1442]

Sample Size People..........should we really be concerned of certain things like run blocking, when they stacked the box against vanilla play calling (you have to be a student of the game to understand that one and some of you are not understanding that), or Whitmer's deep ball incompletions (none were picked and they were attempts to stretch the defense at least, last year JM either never had time to throw that ball or never choose to).....and the same goes for Geremy Davis...kid had a great game but is he a BEAST because he gained separation against UMASS CB's??? Whitmer was very effective in the intermediate game.....he had a few different 12 yard+ passes completed to Davis and Phillips.....He threw tight spirals on those passes and he looked good in stepping up in the pocket and keeping his eyes downfield......He looks good minus the one interception...but he's gotta do it week in and week out.......Every Week is a new season.......Lets not draw these season long conclusions yet (JAYRU09 looking at you) I'm not going to worry and until there is something to worry about....mainly a 1 in the right hand column...........

 

[ZooCougar]

I don't care if we were vanilla. The offense didn't give anyone a warm and fuzzy last night. We won't be able to run outside against teams with more team speed for the rest of the season.

 

[JayRU09]

All in all, hard to tell what your season will be like based off this game.

Yep, that sure is me saying your problems will be season long.

I will say though that I've heard all of these same exact things before (vanilla playcalling, their team's d-line was actually good/big!, etc.), both in 2010 and 2011. 2010, didn't work out so well. 2011 was pretty good to us.

So you never know with games like this, but seriously, the YPC should be troubling. Hope you get it fixed......just sometime after the first week of October.......

 

[SubbaBub]

Other than the lack of physicality from the OL, the only negative thing I took away from last night that could carry over was that Whitmer left the ball to far to the inside on the sideline passes often behind or on the inside shoulder of the receiver.

It's a recipe for an Int-TD if he's not more accurate, but he did look the part of a QB moreso than anyone last year.

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk 2

 

[Carl Spackler]

Look at it this way -- this game looked much like the Fordham game last year. Some negatives to call out, a few struggles on offense, but a dominant victory nonetheless (the final scores were similar). UMass may not be very good, but they are surely MUCH better than Fordham was last year.

according to the courant, UMass hasn't been shut out in 199 consecutive games until last night. I don't care what level you're at, that's impressive. UMass has played some bigger programs recently.

 

[UConnDan97]

according to the courant, UMass hasn't been shut out in 199 consecutive games until last night. I don't care what level you're at, that's impressive. UMass has played some bigger programs recently.

It's so sweet to take our old rival and put them over our knee, isn't it?

 

[Carl Spackler]

It's so sweet to take our old rival and put them over our knee, isn't it?

Don Brown is forgiven.

 

[CL82]

Whitmer seems to lock on to receivers and get greedy. He had Nick Williams open for a first down and threw to Mike Smith (I think) in the endzone who was double covered. He didn't throw it to a wide open Griffin and let him try and pick up the first down with YAC on the incredible INT by the UMass defender.

I was thinking that as well. The pick was a fluke, but why throw it out of bounds when you have a wide open TE in front of you.

 

[CL82]

It's so sweet to take our old rival and put them over our knee, isn't it?

Yes, yes it is.

 

[SHS72]

reading the MA media, you'd think this was a close game. UMass only a play or two away from victory. They have a long way to go, as we should know. thought our D was terrific, O line needs a lot of work. And it was great seeing a UConn quarterback throwing decent passes and UConn receivers catching them. That has not been the case in recent years.....

 

[pepband99]

I'm cautiously optimistic. Whitmer was starting his first college game, and the INTs showed some greenness. That said, he also showed he has the tools to build on.

Most encouraging sign, and something people seem to be missing, was the lack of drops from our WRs. Not only did they show good hands, but they got a couple of balls they maybe shouldn't have. Very encouraging, given play of recent past!

 

[Carl Spackler]

I'm cautiously optimistic. Whitmer was starting his first college game, and the INTs showed some greenness. That said, he also showed he has the tools to build on.

Most encouraging sign, and something people seem to be missing, was the lack of drops from our WRs. Not only did they show good hands, but they got a couple of balls they maybe shouldn't have. Very encouraging, given play of recent past!

All the receivers looked simply, like they belong. Mike Smith is a powerful runner after the catch, and solid X type receiver, and Philips looks like he has some competition from Davis for that Z role. Love to see that.

There's a ton to be happy about last night. WE've got a team that looked really good, and laid a pretty powerful ass beating down on a team that's really not as bad as we made them look.

You just can't win regularly, with the turnovers and penalties. Griffin's holding penalty and turnovers killed our offense, otherwise we would have hung 60 on them.

 

[businesslawyer]

reading the MA media, you'd think this was a close game. UMass only a play or two away from victory. They have a long way to go, as we should know. thought our D was terrific, O line needs a lot of work. And it was great seeing a UConn quarterback throwing decent passes and UConn receivers catching them. That has not been the case in recent years.....

By definition, when you give up 7 points on your first defensive drive and only have 3 first downs, and no long offensive plays, for a game, you weren't a play or two from winning.