Off Season Work

[Cobra 1]

After watching today’s performance versus Army, UConn had serious problems scoring, punting game, pass defense against a team that doesn’t pass, offensive line committing too many dumb penalties,
Our QB has started 11 games so he is not an inexperienced freshman. I question if he is really our QB of the future.
Our receivers as a group are sub standard.
Our running game is good but we do need at least the threat of a passing offense.
Coach Mora and his staff have many areas to improve during both spring and fall practices.
I am not being overly critical of this year’s team; they were a delight to watch and achieved a great season made us proud to be loyal UConn supporters again.
However, if UConn is to move up to the next level improvements must be made.
Are the UConn fans content on 6-6 seasons; I think not.

 

[OGinsider]

After watching today’s performance versus Army, UConn had serious problems scoring, punting game, pass defense against a team that doesn’t pass, offensive line committing too many dumb penalties,
Our QB has started 11 games so he is not an inexperienced freshman. I question if he is really our QB of the future.
Our receivers as a group are sub standard.
Our running game is good but we do need at least the threat of a passing offense.
Coach Mora and his staff have many areas to improve during both spring and fall practices.
I am not being overly critical of this year’s team; they were a delight to watch and achieved a great season made us proud to be loyal UConn supporters again.
However, if UConn is to move up to the next level improvements must be made.
Are the UConn fans content on 6-6 seasons; I think not.

Please explain how the pass defense struggled when they had 0 yards passing.

 

[Austin316]

Next year’s schedule looks promising… we only graduate 10 so as long as Mora can maintain a solid core group of guys I think we’ll be competitive 6+ wins easy.​

​

2023​

• 09/02 - Duke
• 09/09 - at Georgia State
• 09/16 - FIU
• 09/23 - NC State
• 09/30 - Utah State
• 10/07 - at Rice
• 10/21 - USF
• 10/28 - at Boston College
• 11/04 - at Tennessee
• 11/11 - at James Madison
• 11/18 - Sacred Heart
• 11/25 - vs UMass (in City TBD)

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Next year’s schedule looks promising… we only graduate 10 so as long as Mora can maintain a solid core group of guys I think we’ll be competitive 6+ wins easy.​

​

2023​

• 09/02 - Duke
• 09/09 - at Georgia State
• 09/16 - FIU
• 09/23 - NC State
• 09/30 - Utah State
• 10/07 - at Rice
• 10/21 - USF
• 10/28 - at Boston College
• 11/04 - at Tennessee
• 11/11 - at James Madison
• 11/18 - Sacred Heart
• 11/25 - vs UMass (in City TBD)

I'm thinking 8-0 when we invade Knoxville.

 

[Chin Diesel]

QB competition needs to be open. Let's see what can happen.

WR needs a massive upgrade. Need receivers who can get separation and win the 50/50 ball.

TE. If we have a 100% overhaul there, I'm okay with it. I consider Joly to be a WR more than a TE.

RB is fine. Add depth and get Carter back healthy.

OLine. Let's see what these injured freshmen can do. RT needs a big upgrade for pass blocking.

Definitely need a new C from outside the roster.

Kicker is fine.

DLine has lots of returning talent. Beef them up and build depth.

LB needs a massive replacement of talent. Two or more transfers are needed here.

DB's need to replace some talent. Use existing depth and transfers to help out here.

Punter needs help.

KO return and PR need players who grab and go. Especially PR.

Coaching. Mora owns this staff and picked them. Charlton needs to get better in game with adjustments by D and figure out how to impose UConn will on defense.

ST coaching needs improving.

Illegal procedure penalties need to go away. At least two games UConn had 5+ false starts calls.


Team went from one win to at least six. There is a lot to build on and next year's schedule looks like 7 or maybe 8 is possible.
NC State at home is probably second toughest team on sked.

 

[shizzle787]

I'm thinking 8-0 when we invade Knoxville.

I honestly don't think that that is crazy to think. We play 3 ACC teams (one of which we beat this year) and 5 G5 teams. It is doable. Not likely, but doable. I do think the goal should be to be bowl eligible going into the Tennessee game.

 

[Cobra 1]

Please explain how the pass defense struggled when they had 0 yards passing.

Pass interference call when Army had 3 and 17? on Army 20 led kept drive alive and led to Army touchdown.
My not positive as to exact line of scrimmage but that DB made the bonehead play of game.

 

[Rich]

Keep tabs on players at schools that will hire new head coaches.

 

[Da_Aisijimo_Gou]

Please explain how the pass defense struggled when they had 0 yards passing.

Details, details, details, must have been Army's 1 incompleted pass out of 1 total attempt. /singular

 

[warbler1055]

Please explain how the pass defense struggled when they had 0 yards passing.

The PI killed us.

 

[gsmooth]

Keep tabs on players at schools that will hire new head coaches.

very smart idea on operations, I like it. In fact the UConn staff should have a continual running list of these schools starting now with schools that have coaches on the hot seat and keep a list of players in these schools that Mora's staff would be interested in. Once the season is over in December before bowl season some of these schools will keep their coaches while many others will fire them. And the last step would be to crosscheck these schools via the transfer portal.

 

[Palatine]

The PI killed us.

It was 3 and 17 with he clock runnning and about 4 minutes to go and we called time out.

Bad move. Instead of making them go with the clock running. The time out allowed them to go to the sideline,make a QB change to their passing QB. And dial up a play to get the first down.

Our CB paniced and on a ball he could of INT he decided to grab the WR. So they had the first down and still had almost four minutes to work the clock. They scored with 18 seconds left in the half. The time out made all of it possible. Huge turning point in the game.

 

[Scrutineer]

QB competition needs to be open. Let's see what can happen.

WR needs a massive upgrade. Need receivers who can get separation and win the 50/50 ball.

TE. If we have a 100% overhaul there, I'm okay with it. I consider Joly to be a WR more than a TE.

RB is fine. Add depth and get Carter back healthy.

OLine. Let's see what these injured freshmen can do. RT needs a big upgrade for pass blocking.

Definitely need a new C from outside the roster.

Kicker is fine.

DLine has lots of returning talent. Beef them up and build depth.

LB needs a massive replacement of talent. Two or more transfers are needed here.

DB's need to replace some talent. Use existing depth and transfers to help out here.

Punter needs help.

KO return and PR need players who grab and go. Especially PR.

Coaching. Mora owns this staff and picked them. Charlton needs to get better in game with adjustments by D and figure out how to impose UConn will on defense.

ST coaching needs improving.

Illegal procedure penalties need to go away. At least two games UConn had 5+ false starts calls.


Team went from one win to at least six. There is a lot to build on and next year's schedule looks like 7 or maybe 8 is possible.
NC State at home is probably second toughest team on sked.

ST needs lots of improvement, and the penalties (primarily on the O-Line) were a real killer.

Total penalties for UConn on the season: 82 for 665 yards while our opponents had only 56 for 495 yards, roughly the equivalent of one extra 15 yard penalty per game (or maybe more apropos, three motion penalties).

Three segments of the schedule that stand out for penalties:
-Toughest three opponents (Syracuse, Michigan and NC State) only drew 10 total penalties (3.3 per game).
-First five games only saw 22 penalties (4.4 per game).
-While the last seven games saw 60 penalties (8.6 per game).

Over the last seven games UConn committed 26 more penalties for 155 more yards than the opponents. Just about the yardage for an average Motion Penalty.

Something went downhill very fast in those last seven games.
12 against Ball St., 10 against BCU and 11 against Army being the worst.

 

[Tdaley]

Part of the increase in penalties is related to to quality of ( or lacked there of ) of the referees. The crews in the FIU, Ball State and Army games were not very good. However, all the motion calls in the BC game were the correct calls. Clearly a problem developed over the season in regard to our entire offense ( not just the 5 down linemen ) with the motion penalties.

 

[Chin Diesel]

ST needs lots of improvement, and the penalties (primarily on the O-Line) were a real killer.

Total penalties for UConn on the season: 82 for 665 yards while our opponents had only 56 for 495 yards, roughly the equivalent of one extra 15 yard penalty per game (or maybe more apropos, three motion penalties).

Three segments of the schedule that stand out for penalties:
-Toughest three opponents (Syracuse, Michigan and NC State) only drew 10 total penalties (3.3 per game).
-First five games only saw 22 penalties (4.4 per game).
-While the last seven games saw 60 penalties (8.6 per game).

Over the last seven games UConn committed 26 more penalties for 155 more yards than the opponents. Just about the yardage for an average Motion Penalty.

Something went downhill very fast in those last seven games.
12 against Ball St., 10 against BCU and 11 against Army being the worst.

Part of that is depth for the penalties. We had great fortune the entire starting line played almost the whole season together. I would have to check the game reports but I think Guidone missed one game, or most of one game with an injury and Lundt may have missed a game early on. Otherwise the line was intact. Unfortunately there wasn't much depth to spell the linemen. Overall UConn is way to the right of the curve on percent of plays played with the same line.

When players have nagging injuries or are getting fatigued they get more twitchy trying to game the snap count because they know they don't have the explosion or strength they normally have.

Also, if there isn't any depth you can't pull players who are constantly drawing penalties. Yes, I'm talking about Niemenski. Three catches for 17 yards on the season and no one else on the roster can jump him for playing time. Need a huge upgrade over him. If you add in his penalties and dropped passes and he's accounted for negative yards this season.

 

[gioff2323]

The PI killed us.

Not the inability to score repeatedly from the 1 foot line and jump on this team early?

 

[Tdaley]

Part of that is depth for the penalties. We had great fortune the entire starting line played almost the whole season together. I would have to check the game reports but I think Guidone missed one game, or most of one game with an injury and Lundt may have missed a game early on. Otherwise the line was intact. Unfortunately there wasn't much depth to spell the linemen. Overall UConn is way to the right of the curve on percent of plays played with the same line.

When players have nagging injuries or are getting fatigued they get more twitchy trying to game the snap count because they know they don't have the explosion or strength they normally have.

Also, if there isn't any depth you can't pull players who are constantly drawing penalties. Yes, I'm talking about Niemenski. Three catches for 17 yards on the season and no one else on the roster can jump him for playing time. Need a huge upgrade over him. If you add in his penalties and dropped passes and he's accounted for negative yards this season.

We need huge upgrade in the blocking tight end/fullback type players on our roster. One of the problems we have had at the goal line ( as we saw yesterday ) is that our best power back is also our best blocking tight end or fullback. Burns didn't get much help on many short yardage runs this year.

 

[businesslawyer]

Please explain how the pass defense struggled when they had 0 yards passing.

If ever a poster has joined the BY with a post that requires not paying any attention at all to what they say ….

 

[businesslawyer]

Part of that is depth for the penalties. We had great fortune the entire starting line played almost the whole season together. I would have to check the game reports but I think Guidone missed one game, or most of one game with an injury and Lundt may have missed a game early on. Otherwise the line was intact. Unfortunately there wasn't much depth to spell the linemen. Overall UConn is way to the right of the curve on percent of plays played with the same line.

When players have nagging injuries or are getting fatigued they get more twitchy trying to game the snap count because they know they don't have the explosion or strength they normally have.

Also, if there isn't any depth you can't pull players who are constantly drawing penalties. Yes, I'm talking about Niemenski. Three catches for 17 yards on the season and no one else on the roster can jump him for playing time. Need a huge upgrade over him. If you add in his penalties and dropped passes and he's accounted for negative yards this season.

Do we need competent TEs? Heck yes. Subject only to the fact that I’m guessing they think they can put 20 pounds of muscle on Jolley in the offseason and he’ll be one of them. But I can’t blame OL pre-snap penalties on having your OL play every down. Most teams want their OL to play every down, and don’t make subs just to give them rest.

 

[gioff2323]

So, we’re are we right now? Are there restrictions on our practicing still even though reg season over? Do we need to stand down until a bowl invite comes? So odd ending early while having a chance to play on.

 

[huskymedic]

Do we need competent TEs? Heck yes. Subject only to the fact that I’m guessing they think they can put 20 pounds of muscle on Jolley in the offseason and he’ll be one of them.

We hopefully get 6-4 255lb TE Brendan Heatherman back from his injury next year as well.