Monday, October 08, 2012

Second viewing thoughts and grade report: Army

At times when I watch these games back I struggle to figure out what went wrong. This one wasn't very tough. We had numerous breakdowns on defense. The offense was far from perfect, but we scored enough points. Spaz's game management was cowardly and he's clearly not learning from his own mistakes. But even then his miscues could have been overcome if we had just played better defense. Make one more stop. One more big play and this is a different game. Didn't we justify this hire based on Spaz's defensive acumen?

Offense: B-

Rettig was okay. He's not setting to throw as often and that is going to come back to haunt him soon. He missed some open men and had a few bad throws. He's doing a better job of moving in the pocket. Of course the protection around him is getting even worse.

It is a shame we wasted Andre Williams' best day. He obviously had a great run on the 99 yarder, but he also had some other nice runs. Also of note, he was solid in his pass blocking. Dudeck looked good and showed good awareness in getting open. Sinkovec was fine, although he dropped a pass.

I only counted three drops on the day for the WRs and Tight ends. Amidon was good and got plenty of space. We probably should have gone to him more. Coleman was fine. Swigert was good. Larmond finally got a pass thrown his way. Porter allowed a sack.

I was wrong about the Oline. I thought they were progressing and just had a rough game against Clemson. Against a tiny Army front they looked terrible. They rarely overpowered in the run game and made multiple mistakes in pass protection. Cleary and Wetzel both allowed sacks. Vardaro was better. White made some mistakes (although many of our best runs came off of his blocks). Gallik allowed too many guys through. At one point he and White got totally faked on a simple Army stunt.

I thought the play calling was fine. We scored enough to win and Martin had some new wrinkles (the end around to Amidon). We also built off of plays that worked like Dudeck releasing late on the wheel route. Williams' big run was the same play we used to get a big fourth down in the Northwestern game. If I had one issue it was that we didn't attack enough downfield. Army's DBs are bad and we could have exploited them more. I thought the play calling on the final drive was terrible. How can you not try one pass? But we don't know how much of that was Martin and how much was Spaz.

Defense: F

Once again our problems on defense started up front. How did we not dominate a game against Army? Even if you say we don't have the talent, we still have the size. Yet no push. No big plays. No making the B back pay. Terrible all around. Appiah played a lot but didn't do much. Rudolph was ok but got pushed around. Edebali saved a TD and also blocked a pass, but missed plenty of tackles. Abdesmad was a disaster on assignments and contain. Did you see how many times they ran right by him? Ricci and Murray played a little and probably should have played more. It is not like our other DTs looked good.

Divitto played like his 2011 self. Much better effort and productivity overall. Clancy was not as strong. He made some tackles but also missed and got stuck in traffic on many of Army's big plays in the middle. Duggan was aggressive but I think it cost us a few times.

Sylvia played really well and did a good job shedding blocks. Maybe we should keep him a corner. He can cover the short stuff yet still provide support on run plays. Rositano was okay. He and Noel had some big hits but also missed some assignments on their big plays. Simmons was fine in limited action. Asprilla was fine but often away from the action.

The announcers mentioned our spacing a few different times. It even seemed obvious to me that there was a problem. Our DTs were a mile apart at times and Army exploited the space with runs right up the middle. Where is the position coaching? Why didn't they spot that? Why didn't we try something new? I know that facing an option is a guessing game and about assignments, but we didn't even try to pressure them or even shift on the Dline on occasion. BTW, prior to this game Army completed 11 passes all season. They completed five on us and attempted 12. They clearly saw something. Yet no adjustments -- even as they were still throwing late in the 4th quarter. Getting beat like that by Army is all about preparation. Many of our guys were out of ace or missed assignments. We are no longer well coached on that side of the ball.


Special Teams: D

Our punting is bad. But we are not making things better by putting Levano in these pressure situations. Is it time to try Powell or someone else? I don't know, but it is something to think about. McCaffery's bad touch on the final return was a mental lapse. When things start to fall apart, those are the things that happen. Guys press. They think too much. It was a factor. We also made mistakes on our punt returns and didn't do much in our kick coverage.

Overall: F

Outside of our roster issues, the decline on both lines and the inability to stop any type of offense, I felt there were two areas where Spaz's mismanagement costs us the game. The first was allowing Army to kick a field goal right before half. How many times has Spaz mismanaged either our or our opponent's final possession before the half? At what point does he learn that you can't just go conservative in the final minutes? You have to keep the other team guessing. You have to try something new. Other teams will scout us.

The other blatant mismanagement was the running it three times after the fourth down stop. Then confusion regarding the punt and the delay of game! So we put our struggling punter in a deeper hole?! Our best player is Chase Rettig. What we do best is pass. Army is terrible against the pass. Why not try one pass on the last drive to get the first down?

Spaz stinks. Plain and simple. This was just the latest game where we lost to a team with less talent and where we screwed up possessions and didn't make any adjustments.

I'll stick to my belief that our talent is better than our record. Our coaching is not. I don't think this is the worst BC team of all time and think we will find another win or two before the season is over. If we do it won't be because of Spaz. It will be in spite of him.

10 comments:

mod34b said...

Our rush defense is ranked 123 out of 124 FBS teams. (CFB stats; based on FBS competition only and exuding FCS games)

Second worst in the nation.

Seems the biggest issue on D is the most basic: tackling. Why can't they tackle? Probably because players are slightly out of position and a half step too slow to make good contact. Players also are gassed by 4Q ( but are terrible in 1Q when not gassed so conditioning probably is not a big reason for poor play)

Also, let's debunk a current myth: BC's LBs are bad, real bad. If your team is 123/124 against the run, your front 7 sucks. Case closed

William said...

ATL:
1) Way too positive on the D side of the ball. It was disgusting, we said it at the half. If Army doesn't shoot themselves in the foot, they win. Our D couldn't stop a nosebleed.

2) Spaz tells Levano to punt out of bounds. Which is absurd considering he can kick it 50+ yards and it was Army.

3) Both lines are an absolute disaster.
OL: Gave up what 5 sacks against Army? For all the crap we heard about pride in OLine U last week, BC had the ball with the opportunity to win the game by getting 10 yards on 3 carries, and they couldn't do it against effing Army. Anyone else remember the 9 minute drive against FSU in 2008? Compare that to now.

DL: Now 1 sack for every 44+ dropbacks. Allowing over 300 yards per game on the ground against D1 teams.

For those saying Gene left the program in better shape than when he took over, I might beg to differ.

-Claver2010

eddierock said...

I agree with Mod on the point about LB's. Announcers keep talking about individual stats (like tackles per game--TPG) in a vacuum. Doesn't seem to occur to anyone that all those high numbers of TPG are indicative of a lousy defense that makes tackles after 5 yard gains and can't get off the field.

eddierock said...

I agree with Mod on the point about LB's. Announcers keep talking about individual stats (like tackles per game--TPG) in a vacuum. Doesn't seem to occur to anyone that all those high numbers of TPG are indicative of a lousy defense that makes tackles after 5 yard gains and can't get off the field.

JBQ said...

The article states that there are problems with "contain". This is a sign of poor discipline. In high school, I was told to "box the end". Kuechly may be part of the problem as an absentee. He made tackles all over the field. Individuals with less talent are trying to emulate him instead of holding their positions. Wait till Burt Reynolds and the bois see the films!

WI_Eagle said...

Anyone seen a good clip of Steelman's game-clinching TD run? I wonder who blew the assignment b/c there was no one within 5 yards of him when he turned up field. It's usually D-line has the dive back, outside linebacker has the QB and safety and corner has the pitch back...that would lead me to believe that the OLB blew the assignment.

Secondly...I was there, right in the endzone where the final punt happened...Levano was a good 3 yards from the back of the end zone...why?...most punters in that situation are literally an inch from the back of the end zone. Levano could only take one step into the punt (or he would have punted it up the ass of the three man blocking wall) and I believe that's why it was a crappy kick.

EL MIZ said...

Spaz is 65 years old and has been in coaching since 1969. this guy is not learning new tricks any time soon -- so long as he is employed we can expect complete cowardice in the game plan and game management and literal cluelessness in the closing out of halves and the game. he brings zero -- absolutely zero -- to the table. his supposed defensive prowess is gone -- our D is the worst in the country, his game management sucks, his steering of the program is abysmal, the recruiting is woeful; there are not enough negative adjectives to describe his complete and utter incompetence.

he needs to be fired. i see no reason why we don't fire him right now and make Martin the interim HC. losing to duke last year was a joke and what i thought was rock bottom, but losing to ARMY is truly an embarassment that has no justification. fire spaz today, send this guy off into retirement. it should've been done after last season and it needs to be done today.

mod34b said...

WI. Guy from EO made a good video with highlight of debaclES at end

Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRDMXi44k6g&feature=plcp

mod34b said...

Check out the video

On the winning Army run, BC is totally out of position and made big mistakes.

We were loaded heavy toward wide/far side of field Army was loaded the other way, including the TE. Play went to near side

We had only a DE and CB on near side. (our DT was over center) DE faked into tackling FB. CB stays with tailback swinging wide Army Guard takes out Clancy. Duggan takes totally wrong angle. Army TE takes out Safety Simmons. TD.

Just bad coaching and bad playing. (not to mention play was run all day and was hard
Y a surprise)

mod10aeagle said...

I'm shocked that there's a rush defense worse than BC's. That's got to be one of those 9-man high school squads from North Dakota.