Room for improvement

If you haven’t seen the G-Day broadcast on ESPN, you missed a rather stunning graphic comparing the performance of last year’s defense in the wins and losses.  Courtesy of cfbstats.com, here’s what I’m talking about:

Defensive scoring

• Wins:  10 games, 24 TDs, 184 total points, 18.4 ppg
• Losses:  3 games, 18 TDs, 135 total points, 45.0 ppg

Defensive yardage

• Wins:  10 games, 4.6 ypp, 292.1 ypg
• Losses:  3 games, 6.4 ypp, 378.3 ypg

The scoring numbers in particular are staggering.  And before you argue that the numbers in losses are always going to be much worse, the spread in offensive yardage was less than 30 ypg (the 403.3 ypg in the losses would have been good enough to rank 33rd nationally) and the offensive scoring spread was less than 5 ppg (the average of 27.3 ppg in the losses would still have been enough for a top fifty finish in the country last year).

Advertisement

Random, scattered G-Day observations

Really, when you get down to it, what did you expect, Dawgnation?  Three of your top offensive skill players depart and you’ve still got the team suffering through the impact of a massive out-due-to-injury list.  Fifteen or so spring practices isn’t going to convert what’s left into a juggernaut.  So, yeah, it wasn’t flashy, it lacked consistency, but G-Day still showed some glimmers of hope.

• Quarterback.  Joe Cox ain’t JT3, but he ain’t DJ Shockley, either.  He really had to muscle up on the deep throws, and it showed.  Logan Gray was a pleasant surprise, and it was good to hear the forgotten man get the love he did from Herbstreit and Nessler.  His arm is certainly no worse than Cox’ and he’s got the ability to run (he was the QB most handicapped by the touch-sack rule on Saturday).  Murray had the “wow” moment of the day with that forty yard bullet, but he’s a true freshman.  Mettenberger has redshirt written all over him.
• Running back.  Largely meh.  As a group, they weren’t bad, but they weren’t Knowshon.  Thomas provided a little excitement at the end, but clearly needs to get stronger.  King looked smooth, but dropping screen passes isn’t going to cut it in the fall.  These guys are going to need a healthy, effective offensive line to excel.
• Receivers.  Let’s just say that if any of the incoming freshman receivers can live up to the hype, they’ll be on the field in the fall.  Outside of Green, this group is a work in progress.
• Offensive line.  No surprises here – some good, some bad.  Get well soon, guys.
• Defensive line.  See offensive line.
• Linebackers.  There’s some depth here again, which is heartening to see.  Good job in run support.  It was great to see Marcus Washington take the field again – along with Curran, he’s got the highest football IQ on the defense.
• Defensive back.  They didn’t look as good as the numbers might indicate, because of all the drops by the receivers, but there were occasional flashes.  Sanders Commings is huge.   Bryan Evans looked very comfortable at safety.  Best of all, I didn’t see any shoulder bump tackling.  But it looked like Bobo was exploiting holes in the zone all game, particularly with the tight ends.

Overall, I didn’t see anything to get especially worked up about, either positively or negatively, although it was clear that there has been a lot of attention paid to fundamentals on defense this spring.  Not taking anything for granted is a good place to start.  Now it’s just a matter of getting the talent deployed properly in August.

*********************************************************************

UPDATE: I didn’t mention the kicking game because, quite frankly, what’s the point?  However, I will say it looked better than this.