RobdF

Well, ECU gives up an average of 236 rushing yards per game (114th in the country), so he has a great opportunity.

They just reported that here on the local radio during their 10:00 am newscast. Really strange timing with the Georgia game this Saturday.

During the game, there was an unsportsmanlike conduct penaly called on number 80 of Boise State (the tight end, I believe). Immediately, Dan Hawkins (their head coach) substituted for number 80. Hawkins then called him over and made it clear, in a very professional manner, that type of play wasn't acceptable. A couple of plays later, he sent number 80 back in with a lesson learned. What do you folks think about that? I could have easily missed it but have you seen us do that?

Hey GarySJ, I'm starting to see the same lack of fire. In fact my wife and our neighbor (who we watched the UL game with) have also commented on it. Hopefully Leavitt will do as he said in the paper and give the young guys a chance to prove themselves.

Well I have a hard time believing that we lack talent. Seems to me each year people say that our recruiting class is better than it was the previous year. So if that's true, and our talent has not improved, then who is at fault for that? The coaches recruited the players, didn't they? As far as development. There has been none at QB. The O-line, which should be one of our strengths, is inconsistent. The D-line, which should be another strength, has been unable to pressure the opposing QB nor has it tackled well. In fact overall, our tackling seems to get worse each week. So I don't know that we were out-coached during the Louisville game. But we may be getting out-coached in our overall player development.

Yes we will rally behind the team. But realize we had two weeks to prepare for Army. And we lost the game because we had poor fundamentals (tackling). This poor tackling wasn't new on Saturday. It was shaky v. TCU and bad v. USM. So with two weeks to prepare, it should have been improved. It clearly wasn't. So the criticism is justified. We'll still watch this Friday. We'll still watch the UAB game. We'll still be there everytime. But we expect to see better results than we have this year, Remember, we are probably a blocked field goal away from being 1-4.

You got that right Bulldad. Throughout the 4th quarter some woman about 2 rows behind my wife and I was shouting "Down in Front". Her husband tried to shut her up but couldn't. So what did we do? We stood the whole time. If she does this again, I will let her know that my 8 years of attendance trumps her occassional attendance so she should stuff it.

JIm, I agree about problems like this every game. It's ridiculous. And when Army committed to stopping the run, what did we do? We went right to the spread. And it was ineffective. Our pass offense was 10 of 23 for 116 yards. 43 of those on the late TD to Bain (which was a nice pass by the way). Peyton should have had the one early in the fourth quarter also. Overall though, the defense cost us this game with the poor tackling.

USF 30 - 10 430 Yards Joe Bain

Beastie, I'm stuck here until my wife is able to negotiate a move back to Tampa with her job. We were in Alpharetta for 2 years. Up here almost 4 now. At least there's less traffic up here. At least we get to go back to Tampa for games. Not much happens on Browns Bridge Road.

Not a bad overview. Aside from the fact that USM's rushing yardage was actually 112. Key point is that Army is giving up 4.9 yards per carry and 229.6 on the ground per game. Of course they also give up 302 passing, so who knows what our offense will try to do. Hopefully we will use the TCU game as our basis for this week's plan.

Houston basically gave that game away with their pathetic punting game and defense on the last USM drive. Hard to understand, since they stopped USM at the two on the previous drive. That was a terrible missed call on the OT touchdown. Even so Houston should have been able to score on their possession and then a PAT wins it. After all, they ran up over 500 yards and only needed 25 more to score. They now have losses to Oklahoma, Miami, Memphis, USM and Rice. They must really be sick over this one.

And oh by the way, how about when we do run Hall, we run some plays where Andre Hall isn't running up the middle by HIMSELF! Like on first and goal from the 2! Coach Hobbie, ever heard of a fullback? How about a pulling guard or tackle? How about a tight end in motion becoming a lead blocker? And no, wide receivers don't really count as lead blockers, especially ours who tend to be around 6'0" and 180 - 190 lbs. Yes we desperately need a new OC.

I'll return the BINGO on that! As you say, you really can't complain about anything from the players. The effort was there, the heart was there and we have enough talent on the field. The coaches (especially offensive) really did not create a game plan which matched our strength against Southern Miss' weakness.

Because smazza, colllege football is a place where the coaches take athletes with potential and develop them. It is a place for teaching. We can not base our offensive success on our ability to get a Chris Leak, Eric Ainge or Brent Schaeffer caliber QB in here as a true freshman. We must expect to develop them. I contend that our offensive coordinator and quarterback coach do a poor job at this. Consider this. Ronnie Banks is a 5th year senior. Julmiste is a redshirt sophomore (3rd year). I think you'd agree both have adequate athletic ability, good size and strong arms. What do you think of the job Rod Smith (our quarterback coach) has done developing them? As for our offensive coordinator. I contend our offensive strength is at RB (with Hall and Crossley) and our O-line (which is in its 3rd year as a unit). Given that, one would think we would run first and pass when the opposing defense puts 8 in the box or run blitzes to stop us. We do not do this. We run essentially the same offense as we ran in 2001-2002. We have better athletes today than we did in 2001-2002, but far worse productivity. That is the fault of the offensive coordinator.

No Smazza, the Offensive Coordinator must put the QB in situations where he has the best chance of succeeding. With the exception of the TCU game, our OC does not do that. Replace the Offensive Coordinator, not the QB.

Forget Gachette, PJ or Ronnie Banks. They're not the big problem. Neither is a lack of talent. We have plenty of talent and athleticism. Our biggest problems are Mike Hobbie and Rod Smith. Regarding Hobbie: Southern Miss gives up an average of 169 rushing yards per game (that includes our pathetic 55 yards last night). They only allow 148 yards passing (also including last night). Common sense would say establish the run to open up the pass (like we did vs. TCU). Did we do that? No, of course not. We went right back to the same old garbage offense which requires our weaknesses (Young QB and Receivers) to win the game. What happened? 4 INTS. USM controlling the ball for most of the game and us playing from behind. Examples? 1st and goal from the 2 and we run a single back, 3 wide receiver set for THREE PLAYS and lose TWO yards at a point in the game where a TD really puts the pressure on USM. Result a Field Goal. Once again we pass downfield on 3rd and 2! And end up punting. Most times that Andre Hall ran the ball, he was alone in the backfield. Even so, he still was 14 for 56 yards (4.0 yards per carry). Regarding Rod Smith: How good a QB coach can he be when the development of both Julmiste and Banks has been slow at best? Basically we are wasting the talent we are recruiting. I am sick of seeing our offense look pathetic and our defense getting worn out as the game progresses. Get rid of both Hobbie and Smith and Hobbie's gimmick offense too.

Penalties and 14 points off the two turnovers kept TCU in this game. Reduce the mistakes and we win by at least 7 in regulation. Great heart and effort from the entire team.

The offense made a lot of great adjustments. I saw motion, running inside and out, some play action, screen passes and receivers running routes in the middle of the field. Overall, the staff made great use of our athletes. More of the same next week please

What exactly did he invest a whole year deciding? It's exactly the same as last year. I'll wait until after Saturday before I really start to berate the coaching staff, but it sounds like we are in for more of the same poor offensive scheme.

Agreed. He and Crossley have both been effective. I like that we are using Hall as a KR as well. He was very effective in that role Saturday. Now if the OC happened to look at the tape and stats... Well, maybe we'll see some offense.

I don't believe it's necessarily a new tone, Bulldad. I think we have all seen the lack of offensive production throughout last year. We all expected some adjustment in the offense, especially with our line being a strength and recruiting some strong RBs. But it hasn't happened. And it needs to. So no new tone, yet. But if the OC doesn't make some adjustments, you can expect that the tone will change as frustration continues to build.

Defense was definitely on the field too much. Consider this. Out time of possession was 24:27. We had: 8 punts 1 interception 1 made field goal 1 missed field goal Oh and with only 8 first downs, we had a lot of short possessions. That's 11 possessions, an average of 2:13 per possession. That's not a lot of time to rest the D. And the DBs were mostly in man to man coverage, running down the field play after play. The only one I saw who looked like he could cover that way was Jenkins.

How about this. We all have careers (or aspire to have them, right?). We all spend time studying to improve and learn new skills, right? One would think that during the off season an Offensive Coordinator would do the same. It is pretty clear that Hobbie does not do this. Our offense has not been refined, it has not been "tweaked", it has not been adjusted since it has shown to be poor last season. Seems to me that if the OC is not going to adjust, the program must by changing the OC. And I'm with you smazza. Give me the OSU or WVU offense with our defense and I think we become a 9-2 team.

OK Bulliever, I'm with you on most of your points. I don't know about the fans need to "sack it up". We were there in good numbers Saturday. We'll be there the rest of the season. But the fact is the offense in its current form is terrible. It's obvious to anyone who looks at the stats from these first two games that we need to run the ball and junk this garbage spread scheme. So it's on the coaching staff to make the right decisions. If I don't see that starting this week and especially, 10/2 when I travel to Ray Jay, I will be all over the coaching staff, not the players.