The View From Section 241 -- Navy

[businesslawyer]

I think one has to start with the elephant in the room. Let's forget the use of times out and just look at the last call. We have second and goal from the half yard line, 17 seconds left, no time outs. The job of a coach is to maximize the odds of his team performing and winning. Not to win or lose mind you -- our OL should have won the line of scrimmage on the last play, and we'll never know if we would have won if we gave ourselves three shots at it either -- but to maximize the chances that the players could win or lose games. The right, odds maximization call was simple. You throw the ball twice -- quick hitters that are either going to be TDs or incompletions -- and then, if you don't score on 2d or 3d down, you run what you think your best play is. Running on 2d down had the risk of exactly what happened happening -- you get one shot at it and one shot only. Doesn't matter if you were very confident in the play, even if for good reason. You maximize your chances. Our coach failed miserably at that. Then watch the post game video that someone posted -- it's not even clear he had any real view of what the situation was when he made the call or what happened and why. He is not going to be fired because he blew this game -- nor should he be -- but he has a long, uphill climb ahead of him if he's ever going to get me to believe that he is capable of managing the end of games.

But it wasn't just the last call. It was two other things that we've been watching for 2 years and 2 games all coming together to haunt us at once. First, the inability to get plays in on a timely basis. Because as we saw on someone's excellent thread, there was no real reason to burn the last timeout. And the unbelievable decision to give up on returning punts, and even finding a way to at least fair catch anything that goes over 25 yards. Both burned us big time. Add up the litany of other things that went wrong -- a horrific call by the officials on the BS "fumble" leading to their third score, Jhavon getting best one on one in the first series (which I believe set back our confidence on defense and led to the god awful first half we played on that side of the ball) and our failure to get started on offense anywhere near the start of the game -- and you have a recipe for losing a game that we had won and, frankly, should have won. Credit to Navy for doing what it had to do, but we were better than them, and they are not going to have the year hatching all at once in spectacular fashion. That was very painful the whole way through.

Not as good observations on offense, defense and specials as I try for because I watched the first half during a meeting, but I'll give what I have. Special teams -- in addition to our punt returning just being forfeited, our kickoff returns were horrid (I doubt it was Beals as much as the blocking, but he can't fumble a return down 21) and I would love to see what happened on their punt return setting up the game winning TD. It didn't look like we even sent more than one man down field to cover it. I seriously don't know what we did (and am not about to watch the tape). Kicking was good again but wasn't enough.

On offense, the inability to generate a conventional running attack against these two teams is very, very disconcerting. I don't know that there is a reason to think it is going to get better. The inability to get anything out of Newsome, especially, is just disheartening. The passing game was just terrific however, even including much better protection. I can't believe we have idiots saying BS under threw a ball. This is college football. College quarterbacks aren't supposed to make 29 good throws in 29 attempts. Great to see Mayala and Bloom involved and Thomas is making a statement.

On D, my guess is the two big pass plays on the first two possessions really set us back mentally (that's not an excuse -- just an explanation), and Jhavon especially, having caught up to the underground ball, can't let the receiver cut him off from it. He makes that play, the entire game may have played out differently. Having said that, however, the unit recovered brilliantly over the last 35 minutes or so. Certainly the best football we've ever seen out of Luke. Stapleton, Walsh and others were almost as good.

So we gave a game away and are 1-1. I said I'd take 2 out of 3 from Navy, UVA and Syracuse and we've lost the one on the road. Is Navy not as good as Syracuse and UVA? Too early to tell. Despite this board's incredible willingness to turn on a coach when he screws up, I don't think the players will. I think they will be ready to dig in harder and get it done at home. Will they have enough to win next week? I'm not sure. We'll see. But I want to be clear -- the fact that I don't expect the players to quit on HCBD doesn't mean that I think he is going to be better at managing games any time soon. That I will have to see to believe. Hopefully, we play well for 60 minutes, we don't have one terrible call lead to giving up a key TD and we don't need to pull the game out in the last two minutes.

Have a good week everyone. If you can. I'm not sure I will. This loss hurt.

 

[RoadTrip]

I missed the fumble TD as I was getting a lemonade, need to see that play. Where can you find a replay of the game anyone know?

 

[Chin Diesel]

One thing I will say regarding Virginia and 'Cuse that gives me (gulp) hope.

Navy runs Ken Niumatalolo's scheme better than Virginia or 'Cuse run their schemes. Every player who is on the field for Navy was recruited by him, developed by him and knows exactly how the coach wants to play.

 

[huskymedic]

I missed the fumble TD as I was getting a lemonade, need to see that play. Where can you find a replay of the game anyone know?

The play is question is @ 1:28 in this Navy highlight video

 

[Uconnalliance]

Ron Jon was facemasked on that drive late that started deep after punt !! Might have changed the outcome, first half was the worst half of football I've seen in my life, this to me is the worst loss next to the Rutgers game after Jazz's death, my head still hurts from this loss today , the drive home was quiet with my crew

 

[Chief00]

I think one has to start with the elephant in the room. Let's forget the use of times out and just look at the last call. We have second and goal from the half yard line, 17 seconds left, no time outs. The job of a coach is to maximize the odds of his team performing and winning. Not to win or lose mind you -- our OL should have won the line of scrimmage on the last play, and we'll never know if we would have won if we gave ourselves three shots at it either -- but to maximize the chances that the players could win or lose games. The right, odds maximization call was simple. You throw the ball twice -- quick hitters that are either going to be TDs or incompletions -- and then, if you don't score on 2d or 3d down, you run what you think your best play is. Running on 2d down had the risk of exactly what happened happening -- you get one shot at it and one shot only. Doesn't matter if you were very confident in the play, even if for good reason. You maximize your chances. Our coach failed miserably at that. Then watch the post game video that someone posted -- it's not even clear he had any real view of what the situation was when he made the call or what happened and why. He is not going to be fired because he blew this game -- nor should he be -- but he has a long, uphill climb ahead of him if he's ever going to get me to believe that he is capable of managing the end of games.

But it wasn't just the last call. It was two other things that we've been watching for 2 years and 2 games all coming together to haunt us at once. First, the inability to get plays in on a timely basis. Because as we saw on someone's excellent thread, there was no real reason to burn the last timeout. And the unbelievable decision to give up on returning punts, and even finding a way to at least fair catch anything that goes over 25 yards. Both burned us big time. Add up the litany of other things that went wrong -- a horrific call by the officials on the BS "fumble" leading to their third score, Jhavon getting best one on one in the first series (which I believe set back our confidence on defense and led to the god awful first half we played on that side of the ball) and our failure to get started on offense anywhere near the start of the game -- and you have a recipe for losing a game that we had won and, frankly, should have won. Credit to Navy for doing what it had to do, but we were better than them, and they are not going to have the year hatching all at once in spectacular fashion. That was very painful the whole way through.

Not as good observations on offense, defense and specials as I try for because I watched the first half during a meeting, but I'll give what I have. Special teams -- in addition to our punt returning just being forfeited, our kickoff returns were horrid (I doubt it was Beals as much as the blocking, but he can't fumble a return down 21) and I would love to see what happened on their punt return setting up the game winning TD. It didn't look like we even sent more than one man down field to cover it. I seriously don't know what we did (and am not about to watch the tape). Kicking was good again but wasn't enough.

On offense, the inability to generate a conventional running attack against these two teams is very, very disconcerting. I don't know that there is a reason to think it is going to get better. The inability to get anything out of Newsome, especially, is just disheartening. The passing game was just terrific however, even including much better protection. I can't believe we have idiots saying BS under threw a ball. This is college football. College quarterbacks aren't supposed to make 29 good throws in 29 attempts. Great to see Mayala and Bloom involved and Thomas is making a statement.

On D, my guess is the two big pass plays on the first two possessions really set us back mentally (that's not an excuse -- just an explanation), and Jhavon especially, having caught up to the underground ball, can't let the receiver cut him off from it. He makes that play, the entire game may have played out differently. Having said that, however, the unit recovered brilliantly over the last 35 minutes or so. Certainly the best football we've ever seen out of Luke. Stapleton, Walsh and others were almost as good.

So we gave a game away and are 1-1. I said I'd take 2 out of 3 from Navy, UVA and Syracuse and we've lost the one on the road. Is Navy not as good as Syracuse and UVA? Too early to tell. Despite this board's incredible willingness to turn on a coach when he screws up, I don't think the players will. I think they will be ready to dig in harder and get it done at home. Will they have enough to win next week? I'm not sure. We'll see. But I want to be clear -- the fact that I don't expect the players to quit on HCBD doesn't mean that I think he is going to be better at managing games any time soon. That I will have to see to believe. Hopefully, we play well for 60 minutes, we don't have one terrible call lead to giving up a key TD and we don't need to pull the game out in the last two minutes.

Have a good week everyone. If you can. I'm not sure I will. This loss hurt.

Quite frankly, a very good summary of our current situation.

 

[Carl Spackler]

I think Coach Booby could benefit from playiing some video football. I don't post this lightly. The last video football game I played was Tecmo Bowl on Nintendo. If you picked the Raiders and ran a sweep to Bo Jackson, you'd score a TD every time, unless the computer decided it was time that you wouldn't score a TD.

There is a lesson in here for Coach Booby Diaco.

I have no idea what gave him the confidence that we would score the TD there running a play as handoff to a back 7 yards deep from scrimmage needing a yard. At the goal ine. to score a TD, to win the game, with clock running out. On the road. Against Navy.

The last time we had the reliability with our players on the field to get that yard was 2009-2010. There's been nothing to demonstrate we can do it since then.

we have a QB that can scramble. he was on target. W e have receivers that are big.

There is no wiggle room here.

We're 1-1 with 10 games to go.

The disconcerting feeling I had against Maine, has not been relieved.

 

[RSTuthill]

What I want to know is how did RonJon not get in? I have only seen the ESPN footage but it looked like the OL had a good surge and he would punch it in but then he got stopped way too easily.

 

[huskymedic]

What I want to know is how did RonJon not get in? I have only seen the ESPN footage but it looked like the OL had a good surge and he would punch it in but then he got stopped way too easily.

The play is @1:58 in the video above.

 

[NEforceUConn]

RJ received the ball on the 7 yard line, talk about a quick hitter from the line of scrimmage which was the one???????

 

[weyuo]

As much as the offense and defense sputtered in the first half they both came roaring back in the second to take the lead 24-21. I believe what really turned the tide was UConn's punt returner letting the ball get by him and roll on forever and ever pinning the offense way back. Then, special teams on the Husky punt allowing Navy to return it so deep in UConn territory setting up their game winning TD. Sure, Diaco blew it at the end after the offense marched down to the goal line but that whole sequence was set up by poor special teams play. Like the OP said the kicking game was good but the rest of special teams was poor.

 

[huskymedic]

I have no idea what gave him the confidence that we would score the TD there running a play as handoff to a back 7 yards deep from scrimmage needing a yard. At the goal line. to score a TD, to win the game, with clock running out. On the road. Against Navy.

I don't have time to play around and shorten this so go to the 1:05 mark. I believe this is what gave him the confidence to run the fateful play. I'm not the formation guru (@Kgun7) but is this not the same play (including Allmendinger)?



I think the quick hit pass or a roll-out would have been the much better first option but to me he seems to have gone back to what worked earlier.

 

[noeynox]

Shirreffs has shown enough in his time here for more of the game to be put on his shoulders. Yesterday and last year against USF were great performances by a college QB. Diaco is trying to win games by being conservative as possible but aside from the ECU game last year, the offense has looked best when playing from behind and being forced to throw. Through two games our opponents have keyed on the run game because they know they're likely to get runs on 1st and 2nd down. Ive said this before but i would like to see us play un reverse and have rhe pass game set up the run game. I believe we have good enough QB, WRs, and TEs for it. The OL looks like they can hold their own pass blocking.

 

[Carl Spackler]

I don't have time to play around and shorten this so go to the 1:05 mark. I believe this is what gave him the confidence to run the fateful play. I'm not the formation guru (@Kgun7) but is this not the same play (including Almendinger)?



I think the quick hit pass on or a roll-out would have been better first option but to me he seems to have gone back to what worked earlier.

Stop. There is no defending this one.

 

[huskymedic]

Stop. There is no defending this one.

Stop your ... I said that the quick hit pass or roll out would have been the better option. I'm pointing out that seemingly the exact same play resulted in a TD earlier in the game. I get the time scenario.

 

[kris1]

What I want to know is how did RonJon not get in? I have only seen the ESPN footage but it looked like the OL had a good surge and he would punch it in but then he got stopped way too easily.

The play is @1:58 in the video above.

The last play was designed to go left. RJ, for whatever reason, bounced it to the right.

In the still shot, you can see the hole open on the left side and Levy (RG) is pulling to lead RJ up into the hole. Video of the play shows RJ cuts it back behind Levy and into the teeth of the defense. It was the same play that RJ scored on earlier, flipped, and from a different formation. RJ didn't stay in the hole. He looked to cut it back to the right side that was outmanned. Once Levy pulled the backside defenders read the pulling guard and crashed down the line (as they should). RJ had no chance.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Stop your ... I said that the quick hit pass or roll out would have been the better option. I'm pointing out that seemingly the exact same play resulted in a TD earlier in the game. I get the time scenario.

And when you call for a chopper it will be there.

Chill. This was a terrible coaching sequence of events that caused the team to lose the game when the chances of winning were high. Dont' try to make it look it different. Coach Booby needs to learn from this.

We fi---ked up the chance to put a field goal attempt on the field against Maine in game 1 to close the half. We f--kied up the chance to score a TD to close the half against Navy.

This needs to improve, before next season.

 

[UConnJim]

Diaco is a defensive coach and he seems to delegate the offense to Verducci. I wonder if there are communication problems with this setup which results in plays coming in late or indecisiveness. During the game, it seems Verducci is calling the game, but I wonder if Diaco gets involved in tight or end of the game situations.

I think Diaco is still in the learning curve mode, but I think he will get better.

 

[Dooley]

And the unbelievable decision to give up on returning punts, and even finding a way to at least fair catch anything that goes over 25 yards...and I would love to see what happened on their punt return setting up the game winning TD. It didn't look like we even sent more than one man down field to cover it.

The Navy punt that landed at our 20 and rolled inside our 5 changed the whole complexion of the game, in my opinion. Up to that point, we were being aggressive, assertive, and playing to win the game. Not getting, at the very least, a fair catch at our 20 was the first step up the timid conservative ladder that our coaching staff seems all too willing to climbing. A timid, conservative play that cost us 15 huge yards and sent our OC into uber conservative mode with 3 straight runs up the middle. Ironically, Navy reminded us that punt returns are actually quite an effective weapon when their guy returned our punt to our 20.

I'm not saying Navy wasn't able to put up a full field drive against us - they could have (and did). But let's make them at least work for it instead of ushering them inside our red zone with the game on the line.

I've said this 1000x in various threads over the years and I'll say it once again: this asinine way-too-conservative(scared) approach to punt returns has got to go.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Agree with pretty much all observations from 241. One thing is clear, UConn is not an effective running team, and maybe that's because the game has changed. College football is all about the forward pass (that sets up the occasional running play). A ground game in college football is, more often than not, when you have a dual threat QB.

The good news is that UConn may have an effective passing game. One that will also open running lanes for BS. However, to be effective HCBD needs to stay away from all aspects of the offensive unit. As much as it will pain him - and many of our "smash mouth football" afficienados - UConn will only be effective (and competitive) if it can rely on its offense to score points and to do so it will need to rely on it's passing game. No more nostalgia for a power running game. The future is via the airways.

 

[Chief00]

As much as the offense and defense sputtered in the first half they both came roaring back in the second to take the lead 24-21. I believe what really turned the tide was UConn's punt returner letting the ball get by him and roll on forever and ever pinning the offense way back. Then, special teams on the Husky punt allowing Navy to return it so deep in UConn territory setting up their game winning TD. Sure, Diaco blew it at the end after the offense marched down to the goal line but that whole sequence was set up by poor special teams play. Like the OP said the kicking game was good but the rest of special teams was poor.

Agree, and that's why Jacobs is wrong about just fixing on the last play or two. People will remember this sequence too.

 

[jackl]

Agree, and that's why Jacobs is wrong about just fixing on the last play or two. People will remember this sequence too.

Now you got me, I'll have to watch the DVR recording for the 1st time.

 

[MilliniumPrince]

There is another elephant in the room in my opinion. This Offense seems to excel in 3 WR sets...so why the hell do we have to wait until our backs are against the wall to go to that package?

Our best playmaker is Noel Thomas, and it isn't even close. Our second best playmaker is our QB. So why are we 2 TE base package Offense? This was true last year as well.

 

[whaler11]

There is another elephant in the room in my opinion. This Offense seems to excel in 3 WR sets...so why the hell do we have to wait until our backs are against the wall to go to that package?

Our best playmaker is Noel Thomas, and it isn't even close. Our second best playmaker is our QB. So why are we 2 TE base package Offense? This was true last year as well.

They don't think they can protect the QB otherwise?

 

[MilliniumPrince]

They don't think they can protect the QB otherwise?

That is a good point, until you watch the first half against Navy, then watxh the second half. This point is true many games over the last season and a half.