What a beautiful night for football. Perfect fall weather (like we've had all summer). A good crowd (the 35k announced looked low to me compared to what I saw) given the harm that has been done to our program. Not much enthusiasm, but we were down so quickly that's to be expected. Did it resemble the crowd for WVU and Pitt in '11 or LV or USF in '07? Of course not. But frankly I was surprised to see as many have stuck with the program as have given the disaster that was P, the disaster that is conference realignment and the fact that attendance at sporting events is down generally. Yes, traffic in CT is just god awful. Yes, I wish they could get us into the stadium easier. But it was a good night for football.
We didn't lose because of HCBD (although I'll get to that later). We lost because they were more talented up and down the rosters. We lost the game because we were clearly wearing cleats that weren't right for the turf, and we watched WR after WR slip and fall trying to cut (while BYU didn't have that problem). We lost because they had more experience and a staff that has been there winning more than losing for a while. And, most importantly, because our team is just not built for stopping a QB of that style that good. Our DEs, to a man, are to slow to even contain someone like that, much less pressure him, and once he's out of the pocket whether he runs or throws we're in trouble. If we play more QBs like him we'll lose more games. Until we get back to DEs who max out at 250 and can run. That's why we lost the game. Yes, whenever you play you can win if absolutely everything goes right. But we never had a material chance of winning that game, and it wouldn't matter if Vince Lombardi was coaching us.
I must say, the unbelievable number of substitutions and players used makes it incredibly difficult to talk about what I saw. But let's give it a try. On O, I thought the OL played competently. Yes, that's not huge praise, but it's lightyears ahead of where we were just a year ago, notwithstanding our losses to graduation. Thank you Mike Foley. I liked the way Ron Johnson ran through an arm tackle, I liked Mariner's burst and I liked Newsome's quickness and elusiveness. But they all need to learn stuff. Mariner did not score running to the corner when he couldn't execute a stiffarm. A Bellamy or a Brockington, neither with his legs, scores easily on that play. I liked the start of the TEs, especially Bloom. Other than Davis, the WRs were not good enough (and by the way -- Geremy Davis should not be off the field more than 10% of our offensive snaps, if at all). Obviously, not a fan of playing two QBs -- and even when I was ready for that the thought that we'd be changing during a drive is Pasquolini level stupidity. As to how they played, Whitmer made the nice escape and through to Bloom, and didn't turn it over, but wasn't accurate enough. Cochran was o.k. Neither got much help from their wideouts, not just with drops but with the inability to cut.
Specials was not, but it wasn't horrific either. Puyol made his kick, and got one KO into the endzone (although he kicked OB also). Wain needs to be better -- he looked like he was too focused on where the ball was going to land instead of just kicking it. Coverages weren't horrific, and if Newsome learns to take a KO and move at full speed even ahead of a hole being there he'll make a play or two this year.
Defense is harder to talk about, because there is not enough speed in the front 7 to stop offenses like BYU's. I can't blame 285 pound DEs for not being Cody Brown or Trevardo. There's no point. Stewart has athleticism but seems to struggle with coverages and reads. The frosh LB from PA -- is it Junior or Joseph -- looked much better to me than Ashiru playing in the middle. I thought Vann was solid. Williams needs to find the ball from the corner. I've never seen in Obi what others do. But I don't want to be too harsh after one game. The buttom line is the D could have quit at halftime and they didn't -- they played their butts off and, with the help of BYU mistakes, gave our O plenty of time to get back in the game. Ultimately, our O didn't finish drives at the level they were going to have to in order for us to have a chance to win.
So what about HCBD? Let's go back a bit, because I was quiet at the end of last season with both disillusionment and a lot of stuff going on in my life. I thought Warde ran a good process and made a good choice. Personally, I leaned to the Narduzzi because of his CT ties, and the thought that maybe he'd stay if successful, but HCBD was a good hire. We had better options than when we hired Edsall, because of where the program is, but frankly we didn't have the options we had when we hired P because of the realignment issues. But it was a good hire. But you never know with assistants if they'll be a good coach until they have their shot. So what happened Friday night? I think a lot of the criticism is silly. I thought the bodies coming in and off, given their number, did incredibly well (I only remember one defensive 4th down where there was real confusion) and certainly better than P's first year. Fifty players playing from scrimmage? No, I don't think you will ultimately win this way, and Friday night wasn't "ultimately." Did he need the evaluation? Does he consider the first three games preparation for the conference season? Did he feel he needed to play that many kids to get "buy in" up and down the roster? Who knows. But he deserves patience, and he deserves not to be criticized WHERE WE REALLY DON'T KNOW WHAT HE IS THINKING. On the other hand, was there crazy stuff happening? LIke not just the two QBs but switching in the middle of a successful drive? Like Geremy Davis being on the bench so much? Like a naked run on a fake FG when we needed 16 yards, not 6? I don't think he coached a good game, or even close to it. But it was his first one and not a game we were likely to win in any event. Talk to me after five games, when we've played at USF and Temple and home and I've seen how we've done.
So that's it. I think many on here, with the joy of a new coaching regime, where far more optimistic than either HCBD's experience or our talent levels justify. 6-6 and a minor bowl bid would be a very, very successful season as far as I'm concerned. And I'm not at all confident we have 6 wins in us. The sooner I see Whitmer not playing the happier I'll be, but if he gets us to 6 wins with Cody, or with a two platoon, so be it. He gets a chance to do it his way. And the chance is going to take more time than it took to judge P unless the guy starts costing us games. Which he did not do Friday night.
Nice summation BL. I could not believe the amount of trouble our receivers had making good cuts and also making solid plays for the ball. It is like they forgot TJ telling them they have to go get it and not wait for it to fall in their arms. BYU's receivers and Davis get an A and the rest of our guys get a D-. I'm not going to get into the blocking by said group. If we had Hill we win, he was that good.
