Where were you when

[Northbound]

Huh? I don't know why we've got guys on the field that clearly have demonstrated problems in coverage, over guys that have shown they can do it.

Bottom line is that our pass defense has been absolutely terrible the past few weeks. It looks a lot worse when you blitz, than when you've got 7 guys dropped back covering the field, because there's more open space on the field.

What don't you understand?

You're making my point for me and I appreciate it.....don't blitz if you don't have lock down ability at the corner position (that is not the right scheme for our personnel). For me without the right personnel there is no such thing as a right scheme unless you are dealing in theory only, I'm not dealing in theory, I'm dealing in reality. Maybe I misunderstood what you were saying earlier, I thought you were saying the schemes are right

P has not consistently shown the ability to adjust properly and create schemes that are effective with the personnel he has available.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

I was quite disappointed by the hire of Pasqualoni (primarily as it appeared to be quite uninspired) and saw the only benefit being that we didn't hire Whipple. I wanted Cristobal but as he was never mentioned (beyond a stray post here and there by me) I knew he would not get the job. For the record, P's presser was quite impressive and I began believing that it wasn't a bad hire.

I am a firm believer in the philosophy that there is more than one way to skin a cat. Our new head coach (and the staff's overall approach) is as opposed to his predecessor's as possible.

RE micro-managed everything and controlled the assistants with an iron fist. Pasqualoni appears to have given a free hand to DeLeone (offense) and Brown (defense). You can win with either approach and you can lose with either approach. The thing is, until everyone (primarily the players) is used to the new way of doing things, there will be some issues, such as a delay of game penalty immediately after burning a timeout to avoid one. We've gone from being predictable and bland to a fault (just ask TDH) on both offense and defense to being overly elaborate and aggressive, even if we aren't yet built or ready for this.

It has been ridiculously frustrating this season as we've let a few games slip away that we could have won and all too often we appear to be trying things that we should know won't work. This season could have been far better if we were only a bit slower in transitioning from what the bulk of the players were used to doing to what the new staff wants to be doing. I refuse to believe however that we already have a verdict on whether P and his staff can get things done here.

 

[ruskin]

{redirect back to thread topic}

When I heard he was a serious candidate.

A perfect storm of an uninspired, unconnected AD with no oversight who took the easy way out instead of doing the hard 24/7 networking it would have taken to find a young up-and-comer with passion.

I heard that Chuck Neinas helped us land PP. Hell, we would have better off with Herbst asking her Georgia buddy Vince Dooley to make a few phone calls.

Whatever his coaching faults, PP is by all accounts is a decent, honorable man. With all the conference uncertainty, I could see a "hey, I'm not the right guy for this job" resignation coming at the end of the season.

 

[Carl Spackler]

to coach: splitting this up, for some reason it won't let me post.

the square peg round hole thing - I get it. I think you've got to make call as to being consistent with your system though, so it's a tough decision. When I look at it though, the personnel physical/speed/size wise isn't quite ideal for the system, but nevertheless, players are in position to make the plays, and have been there, if they make the right read, and make a play on the ball most of the time that we've been getting torched for what 1500 yards of passing in 3 games - holy sh#t we've given up yardage. Very few of those plays for all that yardage have been the sort were Kashif got so wide open the other night. It's not so much completely blown coverages, just not reading and reacting fast enough and making the play/tackle when it's your job 1-1.

 

[Carl Spackler]

and second part:

You need top notch speed to close on a receiver running the cross coming from outside leverage and if you're going to be sendig pressure w/ DB's. Or you don't get to the ball. I believe we're recruiting that kind of speed coming in, and those kinds of players can see what they can do in this defense on film. What botheres me is not showing different looks, bringing pressure from all different angles.... but nobody seems to key on the TE and/or backs and check them at the line. Like the offensive side of the ball early on in adjusting to a new scheme with blocking, the play call on D comes in, and it looks like they're just running the play, and not yet able to adjust to what the other side of the ball formation is showing. In that respect, I think our offense is actually pretty far ahead of the defense. I think this defense is , having hard time recognizing the pass route runners and adjusting their play call to it as a unit. It's unacceptable to allow a TE a free release off the line of scrimmage if you're a linebacker in coverage.

 

[auggie22]

i was a cautiously optimistic p supporter from the start, though i am afraid to say that cracks of doubt are forming. some teams have great coaches and great recruiters. I think we MAY have a great recruiter and some horrible coaches. we are 8 games into the season and only marginally better, and the game management by p is consistently bad.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Patient to Doctor: "My right shoulder hurts when I do this.
Doctor to patient: "Don't do that."

I am totally at a loss understanding your posts on this. What everyone (but you) is saying is it is a lot worse when we blitz so stop blitzing almost every down.

Or get better at it. Why reduce the clubs in your bag to a Three Iron, Wedge and Putter? Learn to play all shots since that seems to be the approach that the better golfers take. We're UConn . . . we don't pass and now we don't blitz.

 

[Carl Spackler]

To people thinking that a head coach like we've got beign out after one season, get a grip. Evaluate where we're at and where we came from and what we've got to work with. We've got a better recruiting class than ever coming in for 2012, both with local players and abroad, through all the crap of the conference shifting we're seeing, and we already retained the entire recruiting class for 2011, not only retained but ADDED to the recruiting class of 2011 through a head coaching change.

We've got an offense in place, that if we coult just complete passes and break a few tackles, it's all there. On defense, we've got a top 10 in the country run defense, and a pass defense, that well, frankly looks like it hasnt' been installed yet.

Lastly - Our former head coach, regardless of your opinion of him, wanted our current defensive coordinator in Maryland. made it a high priority to try to retain him as soon as he got off the plane.

Be patient.

 

[Jarhead_1775]

Or get better at it. Why reduce the clubs in your bag to a Three Iron, Wedge and Putter? Learn to play all shots since that seems to be the approach that the better golfers take. We're UConn . . . we don't pass and now we don't blitz.

Looked to me like they blitzes on damn near every play. And no I wasn't drunk. They didn't sell beer in the stadium.

 

[Carl Spackler]

I am totally at a loss understanding your posts on this. What everyone (but you) is saying is it is a lot worse when we blitz so stop blitzing almost every down.

What I'm saying, is that upon further review, I've come to the conclusion that our pass defense is sucking ass regardless of whether we're blitzing or not. In other words, our pass defense is just as bad when we're not blitzing, as it is when we are.

 

[businesslawyer]

What I'm saying, is that upon further review, I've come to the conclusion that our pass defense is sucking ass regardless of whether we're blitzing or not. In other words, our pass defense is just as bad when we're not blitzing, as it is when we are.

So explain USF?

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

So explain USF?

They, too, are bad at football, and they, too, suck even worse than normal when playing away games. Especially so in East Hartford.

 

[Carl Spackler]

So explain USF?

Humidity. Slippery ball.

Just kidding. I do remember at least 3, probably four tipped balls on passes, and we did a better job of actually getting to the QB with pressure in that game and with open field tackling, and a hell of a lot better at recognizing what the offense was up to and reacting to it.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

Humidity. Slippery ball.

Just kidding. I do remember at least 3, probably four tipped balls on passes, and we did a better job of actually getting to the QB with pressure in that game and with open field tackling, and a hell of a lot better at recognizing what the offense was up to and reacting to it.

And, you think not blitzing every other down had nothing to do with that?

 

[businesslawyer]

Humidity. Slippery ball.

Just kidding. I do remember at least 3, probably four tipped balls on passes, and we did a better job of actually getting to the QB with pressure in that game and with open field tackling, and a hell of a lot better at recognizing what the offense was up to and reacting to it.

We didn't blitz as much. We shut them down. The logical connection to Wednesday night really shouldn't be that hard to see. But I've made the point and will now stop.

 

[HomeKing93]

Just to add to the USF home/away discussion. In three away games, B.J. Daniels averaged about 170 yards in the air and has thrown for one TD. Yet he threw for over 400 yards last week against Cincy at home.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Does anybody have a count of how many times we actually blitzed on Wednesday? do ya? I do. There's a huge difference between looking like your blitzing before the snap, and actually blitzing.

We are not bringing 5 or more players on every down. We're bringing all kinds of looks on defense, and shifting all over the place, and when we do bring a 5th or more, they can come from anywhere.

To say it's happening on every down, or that were doing more in one game than in another? Going to need more evidence for you to make me change my tune.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Now a zone defense vs. a man coverage defense? That's somethign we've been switching in and out of, and that's where I think these players are having the hardest adjustments. We switched from a man scheme to a zone scheme in the middle of the game against Pitt. It's not the blitz packages that are screwing up this defense IMO, it's that switching from zone to man week to week, or in the middle of games, they're having a hard enough time getting coverages down week to week, let alone in games. Under Edsall, we were zone defense. Period. Always.

A man scheme, is what would have been best against a Ray Graham centered PItt offense. When that went out the window, Pitt went to different offense, and we needed to make the switch to a zone, and we played terrible in both man and zone.

 

[Carl Spackler]

This is what I was wondering about from teh coach regarding problems he's seeing with schemes.

I didn't see anything wrong with the man coverage schemes, based on te team we were seeing, but they changed when their #1 rusher and #1 player in pass receptions left the field, nor did I see a problem with going to a zone scheme later in the game.

The fact that we can't recognize pass route runners, and break up their routes, and run with them and make tackles is totally independant of our ability to blitz or drop 7 back.

That's personnel, not scheme. And you need to get them trained better if you're a coach.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Looked to me like they blitzes on damn near every play. And no I wasn't drunk. They didn't sell beer in the stadium.

Doesn't seem like you were drunk. I think you are correct - they were blitzing a lot. My point - "Don't drop it from the arsenal, get better at it". Same on offense (saying this for years), don't just run, run, run and avoid the forward pass JUST BECAUSE the pass isn't effective when you are forced into using it. GET BETTER AT IT.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Get better at it. I like that. I've said my piece on blitzing, but I'm never done. The impression that we're blitzing on almost every down to most of the people here tells me that Don Brown's system is working. What we need to get better at is the ability to recognize and defend a passing game in both zone and man coverage schemes.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

So, how much did we blitz against USF & Pitt? If you have those numbers, I'd be curious. Because to the naked eye, it sure as hell seemed like we blitzed a lot more against Pitt. But admittedly I don't have those numbers.

 

[whaler11]

To the original question. I was sick to my stomach when I first heard the news of the hire. I allowed a few good posters here to give me some optimism.

I was out during the second half of the Vanderbilt game.

They are 3-5. Which is pathetic against this schedule. If McEntee didn't have some magical ability to cause defenders to drop interceptions it would be even worse. That game Wednesday could have been 49-10 or worse.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Or get better at it. Why reduce the clubs in your bag to a Three Iron, Wedge and Putter? Learn to play all shots since that seems to be the approach that the better golfers take. We're UConn . . . we don't pass and now we don't blitz.

Just because you have a Big Bertha in your bag doesn't mean it makes any sense to use it on every shot. The best golfers I know can attribute nearly 90% of their shots to a wood, a long iron, a short iron and a putter. Two thirds of what they carry in their bag they hope to never need to use.

 

[ZooCougar]

The Western Michigan game.