Tiki's Game Analysis: Idaho
by TikiUVA on Oct 4, 2011 2:01 PM EDT
in Virginia Football
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PrintWow, this has been a weird season so far. We have been good, bad, and mediocre. I've been happy, thrilled, mildly disappointed, very disappointed and now I'm just confused.
This week, we played a bad team, and almost lost. We outgained Idaho 496 to 296, and yet we won by 1 point. That isn't easy to do. Three turnovers, two blocked kicks, tons of "hidden yards" and a few untimely penalties all conspired to make this game closer than it should've been.
Still, a win is a win. We're 3-2, which is a just game worse than I thought we would be. We've been competitive in every game we've played, and we aren't far from being 5-0. The problem is, I'm still not sure what this team is. Are we a defensive team? Are we an offensive team? I don't know.
We are, I suppose, an inconsistent team. This was to be expected though, with so many young players in so many key positions. With two first time starters splitting time at QB, 18 year old kids playing key roles on offense, defense and special teams, and with a relatively young and inexperienced coaching staff, we expected growing pains. But this?
Just in this game, we saw several punts get past the returner and get downed inside our 15 yard line. We saw a FG get blocked and a punt get blocked. We saw our QBs throw an interception and our RBs fumble twice. We saw an offsides on 4th and 3 give Idaho a free first down. We saw 2 false start penalties on a single drive. We saw our QB get sacked on 3rd down 3 separate times, each killing a drive.
Some of these are the same mistakes we've seen all season long, particularly the interceptions and the penalties. But the sacks and the fumbles were new. The punt return issues have been ongoing, but the blocked kicks were new. So, what mistakes are we going to make next week?
At some point, when a team consistently makes mental mistakes, questions have to be asked of the coaching staff. Now, I'm not saying that Mike London is in trouble or anything like that. But our special teams have been atrocious. Is it time to wonder if Anthony Pointdexter is a qualified special teams coach? Our QBs have thrown 4 TDs and 8 INTs. Is it time to wonder if Bill Lazor is doing a good job developing these guys?
I don't know if there are answers to these questions. By and large, the players making these mistakes are young. They will improve. The coaching staff is also on the younger side. They will also improve. Do we have the patience to wait for it?
As always, some comments and observations from the game, in no particular order:
- I said it at the time, and I've been saying it pretty much non-stop since. With 6 seconds left in the half, from the 20 yard line, I kick the FG every single time. The chances of completing a 20 yard pass into the endzone were lower than the chances of running out of time. I will take my 3 points and go into the locker room with an 11 point lead. That was a terrible decision by Mike London. Blaming Rocco for making the mistake was also a terrible decision. Sorry coach, that one is on you.
- Once again, our OL struggled against a subpar defensive unit. Three sacks don't sound like that many, but they cost us 32 yards and they killed 3 drives.We rushed for 161 yards, but under 4 yards per carry. We also had a lot of running plays stuffed. If smaller quicker DLs were beating us around the edges, I would understand somewhat. But these teams shouldn't be winning the battles in the middle of the line.
- The defense played their best game of the season, with particular kudos to Matt Conrath and Steve Greer. Chase Minnifield also had a fantastic game.
- With Chase playing so well, teams are going to continue to target Tra Nicholson. I know he is going to be good, and I realize that he might be the best cover guy we've got. But in our defense, right now, Dom Joseph might be better option.
- Corey Mosley had two big hits that caused incomplete passes. I love seeing that from a safety. When he is making those hits, and not getting stupid flags, Mosley is a weapon back there.
- Why did we have 50 pass attempts and only 41 rush attempts in a game that we were winning. If we'd kept running the ball throughout the second half, I think we would've won more handily.
- I'm not a huge fan of QB rotations, but I see what everybody else sees in David Watford. I realize he needs the reps. But please, please, please, start calling some plays that use his particular skills. Putting in him the same offense as Michael Rocco just doesn't make any sense. Watford has some serious wheels, so let's run some plays that use them. How about an option? How about a naked bootleg? How about a QB draw?
- Punt returns have been a problem for several years now. How come I don't see any other teams have the same problems? Why don't we put two guys back to return punts? If we're concerned about Terrell's decision making, put Chase back there as well.
- As an aside, when did we start playing the Good Ole Song before the game? I don't like it. Wait til we score.
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I imagine that this took some gastric fortitude to write - kudos
That game was an absolute dumpster fire. The offense was baffling and the special teams indescribable.
>>---l>
by DKfromVA on Oct 4, 2011 2:35 PM EDT reply actions 1 recs
The thing about Rocco/London
I gotta imagine that he said “Alright. You got six seconds. We kick it or you try and throw it; nobody open, you toss it out of bounds. What d’you wanna do?” And Rocco said “I want to go for it,” with visions of touchdowns and glory dancing in front of his eyes.
Ain’t looking forward to the GT game, though. Oofta.
I don't think you give an inexperienced QB that choice.
I think if you gave Peyton Manning that choice, he would say kick it. I don’t know what Rocco would’ve said, but being a coach’s son, I would like to think he’d say kick it.
Ultimately, the decision is on the head coach and he made the wrong one. If he let somebody else make that decision for him, that is a bigger problem.
We might beat Georgia Tech. Or, we might lose by 50.
Listening to Coach's Corner
And reading a bit more, it seems I was more-or-less right (but so were you). Rocco was told to find someone open in three seconds or get rid of it, but as you said, that’s not a decision you give him to make, you give that to Aaron Rodgers or a senior RS quarterback with lots of game experience.
Pre-Game Good Ole Song sucks
I love the pregame band routine (and am also usually the only one in the area dancing to Tag)…but it’s getting worse and worse. Bring back Rugby Road!!!!
Related: Play Zombie Nation pre-game. Mayyyyyybe pre-2nd half? But why must we hear it before EVERY kickoff. It doesn’t make sense!
Did we do this before the W&M game? I don't recall.
I wasn’t sitting in the student section at that point, so its possible I just didn’t notice.
The last two weeks, we did, and then the team sucked. I think there’s a correlation there.
as a member of the band
‘good old song’ is THE song of uva football and i think it fits much better than ‘hoo time’ (my bet is you don’t know the words to it).
and as for ‘rugby road,’ as much as band members and fans would like to have it back, it’s not going to because of the lyrics following the first one (you know, about being ‘the mother of a bastard cavalier’). orignially taken out for time purposes, it’s now out because of the lyrics and the issues that a feminist group had with the lyrics.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/college-inc/2010/12/degrading_football_pregame_son.html
Wahoowa!
by fletcherjones on Oct 6, 2011 12:07 AM EDT up reply actions
I'm clearly in the minority here, but...
I disagree with you (and apparently most others except for ragekage) about the end of the first half play call.
I blame that one 20% on the decision of the coaches and 80% on execution. Why? Because it is the absolute simplest type of call to get right. The QB had one read and if that read was there, he throws at it. If it wasn’t, he throws it into the ground or out of bounds or hell, even takes a knee and calls a timeout. There’s no real reading the entire defense. Its dead simple. If you can’t expect your QB to do that one right, then you have other issues.
Now, the execution problems also fall to the o-line, not just Rocco. They damn well should have made sure Rocco had the entire 2-3 seconds to make his decision.
What if the read was there, he threw it, and it was incomplete (pretty likely scenario)
Then it’s halftime also.
If the read isn’t there and he throws it out of bounds…does that take less than 6 seconds? Doubtful. This is a play I wouldn’t task an NFL QB with making, let along someone making his 5th college start.
by Brian Schwartz on Oct 5, 2011 12:43 PM EDT up reply actions
The decision was 100% wrong. I stand by that.
Once the decision was made, there was a huge problem with execution. The OL needs to give Rocco a chance to throw. Rocco needs to know to get rid of the ball (or take a knee or whatever). Gotta have a clock in your head.
I’m certain that we COULD run the play in 5 seconds and still have a tick left for the FG. I just don’t think that was a likely scenario. And a TD also wasn’t very likely.
Generally, I love London’s aggressiveness. I haven’t seen us go for a 4th down that I disagreed with yet. (And its unlikely I ever will, because I think coaches punt on 4th down entirely too often, simply because they do not want to get blamed after the fact. Statistically, it is almost always better to go for it on close 4th downs.)
But not in this case. In this case, the safe bet was far and away the best option. I could probably figure out the expected values based upon Randolph’s percentage on a 37 yard FG, and Rocco’s percentage of completing a 20 yard pass in under 6 seconds. The sample size of both of those would make it statistically irrelevant, but I suspect that the expected value would be higher for kicking.
I don't know if you remember
There were rumors last year that when Verica choked hard, Rocco and Metheny were both asked if they were ready to step up in his place- and they both said. no. Yes, obviously, rumors are just that- who knows if it’s true. But thinking for myself, sure, this kid’s only 19, 20 years old, but sometimes you have to give ‘em the chance to sink or swim. We can’t, or shouldn’t, expect Coach London to run every single play from the sideline, to make every single call- our players need to be able to make adjustments on the fly and we need to have some faith they’ll step up and make the right decision.
That’s what I said initially, was my thought- Mike London said “Son, you think you can do this?” and Rocco said “Yep.” We can hem and haw it out over the next few weeks, months, years, but how long did they have to think that over at the game? Obvious answer there, of course. I guess Coach London wanted to see if Rocco had the game intelligence or poise to make that decision, and, well… guess we have our answer.
We can’t, or shouldn’t, expect Coach London to run every single play from the sideline, to make every single call
of course we can, and should. he’s the coach. he’s talking to a (you said it yourself) 19, 20 year old kid starting his 5th game. london (or the other coaches) should absolutely make every call. he’s supposed to be the adult in the room.
by DontCallMeJoey on Oct 6, 2011 1:41 AM EDT up reply actions
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