Rice Owl Scouting Report
History:
We are 1-0 against Rice. Our first meeting was last year where we won a thrilling 38-31 game in which I attended. Rice committed 4 turnovers. Joly had a 59 yard reception, 96 total yards. Rosa had 88 rush yards. Stafford had two rushing TDs. Roberson had a 93 QBR. Good times.
Ratings:
| Teams | Massey | Sagarin | ESPN |
|---|
| UConn | 99 | 94 | 79 |
| Wake Forest | 83 | 88 | 88 |
| Temple | 119 | 143 | 124 |
| Rice | 117 | 114 | 107 |
| Tulane | 48 | 35 | 27 |
| UTSA | 103 | 97 | 99 |
Rankings:
| Stat | UConn | Rice | Wake Forest | UTSA |
|---|
| Total Offense | 54 | 106 | 72 | 57 |
| Passing | 75 | 56 | 45 | 26 |
| Rushing | 39 | 127 | 89 | 85 |
| Total Defense | 48 | 57 | 124 | 75 |
| Passing | 46 | 28 | 132 | 120 |
| Rushing | 63 | 99 | 72 | 18 |
Team Notes:
- This is HC Mike Bloomgren's 6th year with Rice. He is 24-51 all time with the school. He's brought Rice to two bowl games, lost both of them. Last year was his best year going 6-7.
- Had one player drafted from last year's roster, WR LUKE MCCAFFREY, 3rd round Commanders. That's younger brother to all-world RB Christian McCaffrey.
Offense:
- Rice runs a pro-style, heavy passing offense. 66.3% of their plays will be passes which is #1 in all of CFB. However, they are not very efficient with their passing game being only 56th in passing yards per game averaging 240 yards each contest.
- The QB is #13 EJ WARNER, son of former NFL great Kurt Warner. He was actually very heavily recruited by us before deciding on Temple. He transferred to Rice after two years at Temple. I would say he's having a decent year with just over 60% completion, 1573 passing yards, 10 TDs, 6 INTs. I would also say he's still learning the position. His best game was against UTSA where he threw for 347 yards and two TDS scoring a 72.4 QBR.
- The oline is very good. One of the best passing oline in the country. They've only given up 5 sacks all year. The LT CHAD LINDBERG, a former 4-star and transfer from Georgia might get some late round draft considerations.
- Their best WR is #8 MATT SYKES, a 5th year senior UCLA transfer. He's averaging 12 yards per reception. 38 recs, 452 receiving yards. Really good hands, gets good separation. This is with teams double covering him all year. Fun guy to watch.
- Their leading receiver is actually their RB #0 DEAN CONNORS. He has 41 receptions for 282 yards. He also has 74 rushes for 472 yards. Definition of a workhorse back.
- As good as the oline is at pass blocking, they are pretty bad at run blocking. They are bottom 10% for a lot of total and per game rush stats.
Defense:
- Rice plays a 3-4 base. But it's a hybrid defense where the LBs will shift to the line or secondary. You'll see some similarities to our 3-3-5.
- They graduated LB CHRIS CONTI, but most of their best players are back. LB as a whole is probably their best unit. Three especially to look for are #5 JOSH PERCY, #3 TY MORRIS, and #33 MYRON MORRISON.
- I also like their DB group, especially S #26 GABRIEL TAYLOR, S #31 TYSON FLOWERS, and shut down corner #1 SEAN FRESCH
- This (LB+DB) is an experienced, senior-laden group that have played together for a number of years now. They fly to the ball and are sure tacklers.
My Takes:
I've been to two home Rice games, both of the wins lol. Fun being a neutral there. Warner, at times, looked very good. He can take away to get going, but when he does, it's a fun air-raid type offense to watch.
Schematically, this is the same team we beat at their house. We had a decidedly weaker roster back then and they had a decidedly stronger roster. Though I don't think Rice will fumble five times like they did last year against us.
Rice's biggest weakness is their lack of depth at the skill positions. Sykes and Connors account for 50% of the receptions. Stopping those two stops their offense. With that said, I've seen -- in person -- some miraculous throws by Warner.
Our offense has been Jekylle and Hyde lately. First half cold, second half better. Fagano vs Evers. Run vs Pass. It still feels like we're trying to figure it out. I'm inclined to blame the coaches for this. They got good marks for the wide zone run scheme, but that must have known that other teams would figure this out. So then, what is the counter to their counter?
In the post game Wake Forest thread, I broke down the Evers INT play. In real time it was easy to blame Evers for throwing into quad coverage. But the play was broken before the throw when Sheffield allowed the OLB to alter his route. Thinking about it further, I wondered why Sheffield didn't have an option to run outside, neutralizing the inside leverage of the OLB. Are the players told to stick to the play or are they allowed to freelance? I see this in a lot of HS ball. In order to simplify the game for kids, they are told to do this and only this, regardless of the situation. It's the "Do Your Job" mentality taken to the extreme. I don't recall any of our QBs calling audibles.
My point in all of this is that our offense is still primitive compared to the top teams. What we show pre-snap is what we're going to run. This makes it easy to defend regardless of what we call, run or pass. I wonder if Wake Forest coaches picked up on this. You would think so since I picked up on this and I'm just an amateur.
Predictions:
Rice feels like us last year, pretty good defense paired with an offense that is trying figure it out. We lost a lot of close games in the final quarter, final drive last year. Against UTSA, Rice was losing most of the game but put together some miracle drives. Hopefully we don't take this or any opponent moving forward lightly. We are the better team today, significantly so IMO. IF our offense does "figure it out" we win comfortably. Otherwise, another potential heart-breaking lost. I'm betting the former.
28-21 good guys.
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