Perfect weather, outstanding crowd, better food in the Field Club and an improved product on the field. Add in the fantastic half time show from the Grambling band and what's not to like?
Thought the team looked clean and execution was overall the best we've seen in many years. Goff made only one throw today that I thought was poor and our WRs were as advertised (save for Treggs one bonehead play).
People may have been confused by our offense today, in that we passed a lot early relative to run plays against a smaller team. Also, our pass protection may not have looked as good as one could have imagined yet both were products of the Grambling defensive scheme.
They blitz on almost every snap, a duo run blitz (filling lanes) as well as trying to create pressure if it's a pass. They add some zone blitzes dropping DL into coverage on occasion. The net was that 80% of the snaps saw them sending 5+ (often 6) folks after the QB. Why run against that offense when you can kill them with quick passes? And the pass pro without a TE is going to occasionally give up some QB hits with that much pressure. It's a sell out defense that gives up a lot of big plays (as they did).
The only real concern I left Memorial with today was our kick coverage. Not the intensity, physicality or quality tackling you have to have on KO coverage. We have the depth and the athletes now, no excuses.
Our defense played with some explosion and flashed good depth and improved tackling. I liked the speed flashed by Turner, Vanderbilt and White in the secondary. Manley, Davis and Mekari all had exceptional days. Shout out to the much maligned Cameron Walker as well. And Jalen Jefferson made the most of limited snaps. Yet, the guy at the position we most needed to flash that had a good game was Johnie Johnson. He was by far our most effective pass rusher. Didn't see a lot to love about the pass rush skills from our other DEs unfortunately.
Rubenzer had a sweet INT and Drew was very solid at safety as well. Thought Grace and Hawkins had rough openings and neither are yet ready for prime time in terms of single coverage on the edges.
Muhammed and Coprich flashed at RB. We were thinner at WR than expected, looks like we have some minor injuries to that groups 2nd team. Noa looks fluid and natural out there.
I thought the 2nd team OL was solid. Some mistakes for sure but overall not bad. Aaron Cochran played well with one exception where he had to slide inside and pick up a blitzer and simply whiffed. Forest is a player. Folks can hopefully see that he has the arm, the competitive moxie and the accuracy to be a good QB.
I watched A LOT of college football this weekend. We were as clean and well coached a team as I saw. Fewer mental mistakes, penalties, etc than anyone else I saw. Tough to gauge our overall talent level given who we played but I think our offense is as good as folks will see. We're definitely not their athletically with the better defensive teams, especially at DE and safety.
Thought the team looked clean and execution was overall the best we've seen in many years. Goff made only one throw today that I thought was poor and our WRs were as advertised (save for Treggs one bonehead play).
People may have been confused by our offense today, in that we passed a lot early relative to run plays against a smaller team. Also, our pass protection may not have looked as good as one could have imagined yet both were products of the Grambling defensive scheme.
They blitz on almost every snap, a duo run blitz (filling lanes) as well as trying to create pressure if it's a pass. They add some zone blitzes dropping DL into coverage on occasion. The net was that 80% of the snaps saw them sending 5+ (often 6) folks after the QB. Why run against that offense when you can kill them with quick passes? And the pass pro without a TE is going to occasionally give up some QB hits with that much pressure. It's a sell out defense that gives up a lot of big plays (as they did).
The only real concern I left Memorial with today was our kick coverage. Not the intensity, physicality or quality tackling you have to have on KO coverage. We have the depth and the athletes now, no excuses.
Our defense played with some explosion and flashed good depth and improved tackling. I liked the speed flashed by Turner, Vanderbilt and White in the secondary. Manley, Davis and Mekari all had exceptional days. Shout out to the much maligned Cameron Walker as well. And Jalen Jefferson made the most of limited snaps. Yet, the guy at the position we most needed to flash that had a good game was Johnie Johnson. He was by far our most effective pass rusher. Didn't see a lot to love about the pass rush skills from our other DEs unfortunately.
Rubenzer had a sweet INT and Drew was very solid at safety as well. Thought Grace and Hawkins had rough openings and neither are yet ready for prime time in terms of single coverage on the edges.
Muhammed and Coprich flashed at RB. We were thinner at WR than expected, looks like we have some minor injuries to that groups 2nd team. Noa looks fluid and natural out there.
I thought the 2nd team OL was solid. Some mistakes for sure but overall not bad. Aaron Cochran played well with one exception where he had to slide inside and pick up a blitzer and simply whiffed. Forest is a player. Folks can hopefully see that he has the arm, the competitive moxie and the accuracy to be a good QB.
I watched A LOT of college football this weekend. We were as clean and well coached a team as I saw. Fewer mental mistakes, penalties, etc than anyone else I saw. Tough to gauge our overall talent level given who we played but I think our offense is as good as folks will see. We're definitely not their athletically with the better defensive teams, especially at DE and safety.
