Sunday, September 7. 2014Red, Blue And Pigskin
If the first week of the year is all about expectation and anticipation, and the second week is all about hyperbole with only a single game (usually against crappy crappy opponents), than around the country this is the week where we can actually start looking back on what we learned.
Around the country, we've learned a few things so far this year. For example we learned that Byu has a better shot at making this year's playoffs (with their odds still at a little less than slim) than any of the 12 teams from the B1G (who are firmly planted at none.) We learned a QB can make a huge difference (although we've already known this), as Everett Golson continued his regular season undefeated streak for Notre Dame. Golson led the Irish to an undefeated season and championship game appearance two years ago. He was kicked off the team last year, but earned his way back this season and has the Irish at 2-0. Meanwhile in Columbus Ohio State went from playoff contender to struggling to beat Navy in the opener, and losing to Virginia Tech (despite how hard the Hokies tried to give it to the Buckeyes) after the loss of Braxton Miller. In Texas we're in the process of learning if a Football obsessed fan base is willing to suffer through a difficult short term, in order to return to prominence eventually, but this time having done it the right way, without thugs and criminals. Locally we've begun to learn a few things about Byu and Utah as well. No Relief
For Byu the biggest takeaway was just how unrelenting the offense is. For three quarters (1st, 2nd, and 4th) both teams were mediocre. Well Texas was mediocre for all 4 quarters. The Longhorn defense had kept the Cougar offense mostly in check, and especially had made Taysom look very average. The Texas defense had also managed to stuff Jamaal Williams. Despite a missed field goal and 2 fumbles by Texas on their first 5 drives, Byu only managed a 6-0 half time lead, and the game started to feel like the 2011 matchup, and a late intereception left the Longhorns feeling semi confident. The problem though is you cannot relax against this very relentless Byu offense. And the third quarter showed that, as Byu took the opening kickoff and preceded to have as close to a perfect quarter as you can have. By the end of the third quarter Byu had made the most of their 28 3rd quarter plays, and turned a 6-0 snoozefest into a 34-0 blowout, once again leaving Texas defenders scrambling. Texas managed to right the ship a little bit in the final quarter, but all it took was just a little relaxing at half time, and they got swarmed by the Byu Offense. Byu Offense in quarters 1, 2, and 4: 13 points, 230 total yards, 120 passing (3.8 ypa), 110 rushing (2.68 ypc) with Hill getting 31 yards rushing and having been sacked 6 times. Byu Offense in quarter 3: 28 points, 199 total yards, 61 yards passing (7.65 ypa), 138 yards rushing (7.67) with 68 rushing yards, and no sacks for Hill. One More Note On Hill On Byu's first drive of the game, the Cougars faced 4th and 1 and the Texas 30, and the announcers brought up the question of whether the Cougars should go for it, because they were in that no mans land where they were too far for a figgie (especially with their kickers) and too close to punt. One announcer made the comment that he wouldn't because it's too early in the game. My response: Are you freaking stupid? I don't care the time of game, the situation, or the location on the field. If there is very little time on the clock, and a figgie would win the game for Byu you attempt the kick. Under absolutely no other situation, with Taysom Hill back there, should you ever even contemplate not going for it on any 4th and less than 3 situation. Taysom is such a dangerous weapon on any down when the distance is three, because there are too many options for Byu. They could hand it to Williams, or Lasike for a short yard bang. Taysom's passing questions aside, it is undeniable that where he excels in the passing game are the quick slants and underneath, which is a perfect play for less than three. Then add in the damage that Taysom can do with his legs, be it designed run, draw, or scramble. There have been a lot of comparison's lately to Tim Tebow. One place where I absolutely agree with that, is on less than 3 yards, where Tebow was almost always money. On The Verge With Texas out of the way, it's pretty clear that the Cougars are now looking at the possibility of a special season. Texas was always going to be the toughest challenge to an undefeated schedule, and Byu managed to dispatch them in an even more impressive manner than last year. Now as you look out at the rest of the year, it's very obvious that there are only 2 things standing in the way of Byu and an undefeated season. First is injuries. Specifically injuries to Taysom Hill. Last year, and through two weeks this year Hill has managed to take some a good pounding and stay healthy, but be honest Byu Fans, you hold your breath a little bit every time he takes off, especially when he decides to charge head down towards defenders instead of sliding. And to Hill's credit you can't play in fear of injuries. You just have to play your game. But an injury to Hill would be absolutely devastating to this Byu team. Offensively, outside of mass casualties on the OL, the Cougars could probably survive most other injuries. Defensively though attrition could cause problems. The Defensive backfield has never been extremely deep, and we saw last year what happened with just two injuries. The case is the same throughout the Byu Defense. There isn't a single player on that side of the ball you can look at and say, without them they're screwed. But, the defense also wouldn't be able to sustain multiple prolonged losses. As such they hope Bronson Kaufusi can hurry back from his ankle injury. But injuries are a part of the game. The second obvious thing that could prevent Byu from the magical season is Bronco Mendenhall. This may very well turn out to be the best team Bronco has had in his tenure (Right now it slightly behind the2009 squad 2006/2007 squad), and the schedule is breaking just right for Byu to run the table. I'm just not sure that Bronco will be able to stay out of their way for 10 more weeks. Home At Last This week Byu will play their 2014 home opener on Thursday night as they welcome in the Houston Cougars. Last year, the Houston Cougars provided the Byu Cougars with their worst defensive performance as Byu came out on top 47-46 in a back and forth affair that saw both teams combine for 45 points in the first quarter, and over 1000 yards of combined total offense. Taysom Hill had his best career yardage output, and Houston QB John O'Korn was 1 yard shy of his career best. This year the game will probably be another high scoring affair, but not nearly as bad as last season. This will be the first true test of the season for BYU's passing defense as Houston is still very much a pass happy team, and both teams come back with most of the same offenses in tact. Although through two weeks Houston has struggled to get their offense going, and while Byu's overall defense may not be as good as it was last season, the secondary is improved with Jordan Johnson and Robertson Daniel back there, which should be enough to get the couple key stops that will turn this season's matchup from a 1 point affair to a multi score game. Of course, one big difference in this game is location. Last year's game was in Reliant Stadium in Houston. This year it's the hope opener for Byu coming off of a big victory over Texas. The stadium is going to be filled with a bunch of Byu fans hyped about what could possibly be a special year for the team, or at least one would think it should be. A Game Of Guess Who Let's play a guessing game. Can you name the following player: "As a true freshman, and a member of what was thought to be one of the best recruiting classes in that school's history I rushed 99 times for 505 yards and 5 Td's. As a sophomore I entered the season as the starter, but injuries and problems with the coach led me to only carry the ball 86 times for 298 yards. Following my sophomore season I decided to transfer. At my new school I once again became a featured offensive weapon, and I ran for 807 yards and returned to a greater than 5 yards per carry average for a team that won our conference. This year, I missed the opener due to injury, and in week 2 got to play against my first school's rival. Unfortunately my team royally sucks now that our star QB graduated and much like in my freshman season, my coach is making the beyond stupid decision to go with a two QB system." Okay time to guess. Read on to find out. About That Whole Actual Competition Thing, Nevermind. Last week I mentioned that after the week 1 prostitution game against Idaho State, it would be nice to see how the Utes do against something resembling actual competition. After week 2 we're still waiting. The Utes rolled over Fresno State on their way to a 59-27 blowout, that was actually 45-7 before the Utes made wholesale changes to let second stringers play defense, but that doesn't mean there weren't some positives to take away from week 2. In week 1, despite getting blown off the field by USC, the one bright spot for the Bulldogs was their rushing attack as they racked up 157 yards on a 4.8 yards per carry average. They were led by Marteze Waller, who got 97 yards. All this despite the game being a blowout. For Utah, one of the big concerns out of week 1 was the fact they gave up 179 yards rushing, 133 by Xavier Finney, to Idaho State. During the week, Whittingham mentioned it was a matter of changing gap assignment, and gap integrity. With the Bulldogs expecting senior running back Joshua "Juice" Quezada (did you guess correctly?) back, it would be important for the defense to get righted correctly. Sure enough, the Ute defense came ready to play. They started the game with 5 straight 3 and outs. In fact, the Utes went the entire first quarter without giving up a first down, and only allowed the Bulldogs to gain a total of 4 yards in the quarter on the Bulldogs 5 full drives. For the game, the Utes allowed 55 total rushing yards when their 6 sacks got figured in. Marteze Waller had 61, and Quezada was held to -4 yards on 3 carries. Of course not everything was absolutely great, as the Utes secondary was exposed a little bit for their lack of depth and experience on the boundaries. In particular Senior Eric Rowe, who moved over to corner this year had an extremely difficult day. On one series in particular Rowe was targeted over and over, and had a series of mistakes that kept alive a drive that turned into the Bulldogs first TD of the game. Rowe is trying to make the same move that Keith McGill did last year, but through two games is still struggling at his new position. Something that could cause concern as the competition begins to ramp up. To be fair to Rowe though, Josh Harper is an extremely good WR. Last year he caught 13 TD's and racked up over 1000 yards. He's on the Belitnikoff Watch list, and is currently considered a 2nd round draft pick in the 2015 NFL Draft, so it's a tough matchup for anyone playing only their 2nd game at corner, but if Rowe better learn fast, because the Pac-12 has some pretty good WR's. View From The Red Zone For the second straight week fans were treated to a game that was over by the first quarter. Add in the extremely warm midday weather, and it's no doubt why the biggest cheer in the 2nd half came when there was finally some cloud cover. Another thing I observed is how badly the dearth of interceptions is starting to get into the heads of the Utah secondary. A couple times as the game wore on, defensive backs to extremely risky gambles on plays, solely trying to finally break through and nab that interception. I have a feeling that when the Utes finally get a couple turnovers, especially interceptions, it's going to be like a flood gate opens, and they'll nab more of them, but until that happens you can tell it's definitely on their minds. The other observation I had was just how drastically improved Travis Wilson seems. Now I'm not talking about his stats, as they are very similar to what he had last year after two games. Instead I'm talking about his decision making. On the season Wilson is 24/38 (63.2%), but I have yet to see him make bad pass. That's not to say all his throws have been perfect, because they haven't. By not having a bad pass, I mean he hasn't made a bad decision on when to throw the ball, or where to throw the ball. Not one of his passes have been intercepted, or even been in danger of being intercepted. For a guy who was a bit of a gunslinger last year, and ended up with 16 interceptions in 9 games of action, this was a real concern. Wilson needs to take better care of the ball than he did in the past, and through two games he has done that extremely well. You can see it when he's making his reads as well. Multiple times in the last two games you could see he had a guy he wanted to throw it to, but the window wasn't enough to be comfortable with. Rather than try to squeeze it in there, he'd take the smart play and run, or throw it away. Now this could all change as the competition ramps up, but threw two games, his worst decision is that he didn't get far enough outside the tackle box on a throw away and got called for intentional grounding. That's something I can live with. Early Bye Week This week, the Utes are on the first of their two byes. While I'm not usually a fan of such early bye weeks, I'm okay with it this year. Mainly because, after two weeks of sub optimal competition, the Utes prepare to travel to play in front of the 100,000+ fans of the Big House next week as they face off against the Michigan Wolverines. Not only that, but due to their schedule the rest of the way, their is a strong case to be made that this could be the most important game of the season, which I'll get into more next week. Fashion Police A bit of uniform news for this week. First off, after having now seen the red versions on the players in action the last two weeks, and seeing a video of the white version on some of the players, I have to say that I actually don't mind the new Utah uniforms, and actually like them some. The mountains on the sleeves may not have come through nearly as much as been intended, but I like that the front of the jerseys have been stream lined a bit. All in all I actually prefer these jerseys to the ones the Utes have had the previous few years. The second bit of news for the Utes is the reveal of the all-white Helmet. I'll have to admit, those look sweet. This does perhaps explain why the date for the annual With Thursday being the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, a few tributes are being planned for the game in Provo. One such tribute is for both Byu and Houston to wear USA themed helmets during the game. In the first battle of the week between these two teams, Byu comes out on top, just like they hope to do Thursday. Broadcast Info As has been mentioned the Cougars have a Thursday night game and kickoff on ESPN at 7:00 p.m. Utes are on bye this week, but it was announced that their game next week against Michigan will be on ABC at 1:30 p.m. MST. With both BYU and Utah not playing this Saturday, if you want to scout the Wolverines they'll be playing this week at 1:30 p.m. on the Big Ten network. Trackbacks
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