Monday, October 22. 2012Red, Blue And Pigskin
This past week the Utes and the Cougars took their combined 6-7 record to play two teams who were a combined 11-0, and ranked 8th, and 5th in the nation respectively. Not surprising the win totals for one group of teams stayed static at 6, while the loss total for the other group remained a goose egg.
What's of more concern for both teams is how the games unfolded. One team saw the story of their season play out the same as it has all year, while the other team flipped the script on what had been ailing them. The Best Team Of Utah
Looks like we finally have the answer to the broken transitive property that tries to figure out the best team for the state of Utah. It's clearly the Oregon State Beavers after they have beaten both BYU and Utah in consecutive weeks with a backup QB. This week said backup QB came down to earth a bit from his amazing debut the previous week against the Cougars, but in the end he was still able to lead the Beavers to a 21-7 victory over the Utes. Same Story, Different Week For the Utes, the loss to the Beavers was a sickening case of Deja Vu. For the third week in a row,the Utes we're hanging tough late in a game they could have, only to eventually be undone by stupid, costly, mental mistakes. Two costly first quarter turnovers by Travis Wilson led to 14 of the Beavers 21 points. Down 14-7 to start the 2nd half, the Utes got the ball and drove down to the Beavers 3 yard line, only to have DeVonte Christopher, who was also partially at fault for Travis Wilson's early interception, fumbled a pitch on a reverse. Beavers recovered. Still trailing 14-7 in the fourth quarter, Beavers ball around mid field, facing 3rd and long, Brian Blechen, clearly, and blatantly lowers his helmet to spear an OSU receiver, personal foul, first down, drive extended and ends in a touch down. Utah's defense played arguably their best game of the year. They kept a Beaver offense, that just got done toasting the BYU defense the week before, in check, only giving up one score to the Beavers on a drive that started farther than the Utes 40 yard line. The Offense played one of their better games as well. Just like they did the week before against UCLA, and the week prior against USC, the Utes are showing they have the ability to hang in their during these Pac-12 Conference games. What they are also showing, is that they don't have the ability to overcome mistakes, and self inflicted wounds, against the better teams on a week in and week out basis. And to make the mistakes on the field even worse, is when their are blatant terrible mistakes up in the booth 8 + 0 = 1/2 = 0-2 I knew when he was hired Brian Johnson was going to have to grow on the job, and there would be some struggles. I'll even admit there's been signs of growth for Johnson so far during the season. However his struggles have really come to light in some crucial spots. Most notably the last two weeks at or inside the opponents 5 yard line. The last two weeks the Utes have been able to run 8 plays at or inside their opponents 5 yards lines. During those plays John White and Kelvin York accumulated zero touches. In fact, only once during those 8 plays, was a call even sent in that could possibly have given a touch to White, it was on first and goal this week when a Zone/Read was called in. Unfortunately Wilson made the incorrect read, and kept the ball. The other 7 plays though, consisted of 2 QB draws, 3 passes by Wilson, 1 TD Pass by Jon Hays, who was in due to the helmet rule, and the aforementioned disastrous reverse that DeVonte fumbled. It's just inexcusable not to give your running backs any more than 1 possible touch in 8 plays when you are that close to the goal line. The Rudest Welcome Now it's time for Utah's annual This year the Cal Bears are struggling much the same as the Utes and come into the game with an identical 2-5 record. The Bears started the season with a Grand Reopening of their stadium that saw them lose to Nevada. And while they've had some bright spots, beating UCLA, they've been inconsistent all season, and are coming to Utah after losing their Rivalry game, "The Big Game" to Stanford last week for the 4th consecutive season. Now both teams come into the weekend looking for a win to possibly turn around their season. They've both struggled through difficult first half schedules, Utah with the 2nd ranked strength of schedule, Cal with the 17th, and are both hoping that a win this weekend, will give them momentum as they go to an easier stretch of games. Now I'm not one for crazy predictions, but because both of these teams have shown improvements the last few weeks, and have been oh so close. And because both teams have played difficult first half schedules, and heck even because both teams have their rivalry games over with, I'm going to make a prediction right now. The winner of this week's game will go on to become bowl eligible. Flipping The Script I know I've mentioned before that having Riley Nelson as the Quarterback for the Cougars meant they probably wouldn't beat a decent team all year, due mainly to the fact that he's a fullback, and not a quarterback. I also know that most are putting the Notre Dame loss on his, battered, back. I for one am not. In a flip of the usual script for the Cougars this year, I don't think Nelson was the reason that the Cougars were unable to spring the Ackbar Alert against Notre Dame. In fact I think the bigger reason for the 17-14 loss, was the defense, and more specifically the rush defense. Don't get me wrong, Riley had his usual mistakes. Specifically a brutal interception by Manti Te'o early that led to the first score for the Irish, and late he completely missed a wide open Cody Hoffman, who would have walked, untouched, into the end zone to put the Cougars up 21-17. The latter being a pass that Riley says will haunt him forever. The truth is though, that game was about as good as anyone can expect from not only Riley, but the current iteration of the offense. If you are asking more than 63% completion, 2 TD's and only 2 Interceptions (1 of which was garbage time), with no fumbles from Riley, than you are expecting too much. The real reason the Cougars lost this game, was because, for the second week in a row, their defense got gashed. Only this week, it was their run defense that got gashed. The Irish ran for 270 yards on the Cougars, and senior running back Theo Riddick got a career high 143 on his own. Riddick wasn't the only 100 yard rusher for the Golden Domers as Cierre Woods also broke the century mark. All this running being done despite not having a passing threat all game. And although the game looked close on the score board, let's not forget that the Irish twice moved deep into BYU territory only to come up with nothing, because as we've all learned, kickers in college suck. Interesting Factoid With starting Quarterback Everett Golson out with a concussion, the Fighting Irish turned to backup Tommy Rees. Rees' victory now makes backup QB's 3-0 against BYU this season, joining Cody Vaz of Oregon State, and Jon Hays of Utah. Assignment Football What's more troubling about BYU getting gashed on the ground is the team they face next. The Cougars take their show to the deep south to take on the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets, and their triple option rushing offense. Now there's always the possibility that the Notre Dame game was a fluke. The Cougars also are very familiar with the triple option having faced it, with pretty good success, on a yearly basis in the Mountain West Conference when they would play Air Force. However, I think of all the defenses of Bronco Mendenhall's tenure, despite being his best defense, this is the defense least ready to face a triple option. The reason being, defending the triple option defense requires sound assignment football. As a defender you have to take on your assignment, and only your assignment. Some of BYU's lesser defenses, were very assignment sound, which is why they rarely struggled with the option. This defense is different. Part of what makes them so good, is that they are a bit more reckless. Led by Kyle Van Oy, and Ziggy Ansah, this defense is a bit more of a gambling defense. Especially in the secondary, where they can get a bit nosy. They like to play on the edge, and sometimes over the edge. It's what's made them so effective all year. It's also the exact same tendencies that can allow a triple option to break off some big plays. A secondary that likes to get nosy to begin with, will also start creeping up to the line of scrimmage to stop the run, and that's when a triple option offense breaks out those surprise passes over the top. For example, just look at how Utah always struggled with the Air Force Falcons, despite all their good to great defenses. The Cougars play a style of defense this year, very similar to Utah's. Utah always got involved in tight slugfests with the Falcons. The Falcons also always seemed to have one of their best passing days against the Utes, because the secondary would get caught sneaking up. That's the struggle the Cougars face this week. Only to make matters worse, their room for error is very slim with Riley and the boys on offense, and that's before you get to the offensive line that has now suffered it's 8th major injury of the year. Riley's Legacy As Riley's career comes to an end at BYU, and this weekend being senior day, the question of his legacy starts to come to mind. With only 1, possibly 2 depending on bowl opponent, game really left, what is Riley's legacy? Will it be that he the hard working, gritty leader, with limited talent who was able to save the 2011 season? Will it be that Bronco's love affair with Riley cost the Cougars three seasons, and possibly more? Will his legacy be that he ran off Jake Heaps? Will the way the coaching staff handled Riley scare off future recruits? Will his legacy be that he just couldn't win the big games, but was great against the scrubs? Will his legacy just be that the rule that should be called the Manti Te'o Rule was incorrectly named after him? We won't really know his full legacy till we see how Jake Heaps does the next two years at Kansas. If Heaps succeeds and lives up to the freshman hype, does that hurt Riley's legacy? So BYU fans, I'll ask again at the end of the season, but start thinking about it now. What is Riley's legacy with really only one more game to write it. (The last three games are really just bowl practices.) Now that his careers coming to an end, are your memories of him fond ones, or has the turnover fest of this year soured them? Trackbacks
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