The Official TBP In Game Thread: Bulls vs. Illinois Fighting Illini

[206BULL]

49 minutes ago, charsibb said:

Wish I could, but I have 8AM classes on Friday.

Might take you up on this for UCF or one of the Saturday games, though!

Sounds good. Skip UCiF on Black Friday though. I’ll be down in the SD area for Thanksgiving and then either staying down there for the weekend or spending the weekend in LA. Any other game the offer stands. 

[feardabull]

24 minutes ago, footnfan1 said:

Was I wrong?

You called the margin of victory right on the spot. It was..... supernatural

[footnfan1]

I know. Its a thing with me. It's nit supernatural, it's Footnfan-ish. It's what I do. 

 

Watching Memphis now, oh boy. They are for real.

[charsibb]

1 hour ago, footnfan1 said:

I know. Its a thing with me. It's nit supernatural, it's Footnfan-ish. It's what I do. 

 

Watching Memphis now, oh boy. They are for real.

Offense is good, defense is questionable.

[charsibb]

2 hours ago, 206BULL said:

Sounds good. Skip UCiF on Black Friday though. I’ll be down in the SD area for Thanksgiving and then either staying down there for the weekend or spending the weekend in LA. Any other game the offer stands. 

Sounds good. Will probably try to get out your way if we're still undefeated for Cincy

That's still Homecoming, right?

[bullsfan27]

24 minutes ago, charsibb said:

Sounds good. Will probably try to get out your way if we're still undefeated for Cincy

That's still Homecoming, right?

Cincy is the homecoming game this year. Was supposed to be Umass but with the schedule change it's Cincy instead

 

[CousinRicky]

Finally getting to the 'pen after having a couple of busy days. Read through this whole thread. How freaking entertaining you guys are.  Thanks.  The one thing that stands out to me from the game, besides our kicking woes, is that Stony Brook would shut out Illinois.

[charsibb]

After rewatching the game (thanks Python!), it's time for me to eat some crow.

One of the reasons I was so down on CCS before was because I was watching the ESPN video feed and the USF Radio audio feed, which were over 1 minute apart. Watching synchronized a/v made the game look less bad. Still, there are some really bad areas, we were lucky to be playing against such weak teams so far, or we'd be 0-3 instead of 3-0

1. We don't pass the eye test. Yes we won by a large margin, but not in a dominating fashion. Part of that is the simple lack of enthusiasm. The crowd was subdued, and the players showed very little emotion. If we're going to be a perennial Top 10 team from the G5, we need a LOT of swagger. And CCS needs to stress the style points. Winning isn't enough for G5, HOW you win is just as important. Compare our game to Miss St. v. LSU...

2. Penalties were ridiculous. Most of this is solvable, though. Half were false starts or motion, which may have been caused by trying to go too fast. The two defense calls on Senat and Sawtelle were legit, and would get called 9 times of ten. This is the second time for Senat. What this tells me is that the coaches aren't stressing discipline enough. It would be (somewhat) more acceptable if this was undiscipline caused by overzealousness (like the old U.Miami or Oakland Raiders), but it's not. If anything, we're playing under-zealous. No, these penalties seem to be simply from a lack of focus. (to be fair, the improvement in tackling is likely caused by a HUGE improvement in focus)

3. Blocking assignments on special teams are atrocious. This is certainly fixable, but it's one of those "little things" that really deduct style points. And if we don't fix it, it's going to lose us some games down the stretch.

4. Running was the best all year, but still not where we should be (Illinois defense is the youngest in the league), but passing is still questionable. Sure, Q's stats suffered from 4-5 drops, but he also flat out missed 4-5 receivers. According to one of the TV announcers, it could be more on footwork than anything else. Which gets us right back to coaching. One comment the announcer made is that CCS said he was going to make Q into an NFL-style QB. Not sure where he got the quote from, but it seems like a bad idea from a USF standpoint, even if it might be a plus for Q (and for future recruiting efforts)

While I still have a lot of lingering anger from our inability to step up and dominate in the fashion we were expected to (and should have done), which caused us to drop in the polls, I admit that the sky is not falling, and this team has the chance to have a very special season.

Just really ticks me off that we could still have been in the running for the natty, and Q in the running for the Heismann, but CCS' too-conservative play, and the lack of discipline, has knocked us backwards. Maybe we can make up the lost ground, maybe not. But we CAN get a lot better than what I've seen so far. Ceiling is very high for this team.

Go Bulls!!

P.S. Pass the salt...

 

[NewEnglandBull]

7 minutes ago, charsibb said:

After rewatching the game (thanks Python!), it's time for me to eat some crow.

One of the reasons I was so down on CCS before was because I was watching the ESPN video feed and the USF Radio audio feed, which were over 1 minute apart. Watching synchronized a/v made the game look less bad. Still, there are some really bad areas, we were lucky to be playing against such weak teams so far, or we'd be 0-3 instead of 3-0

1. We don't pass the eye test. Yes we won by a large margin, but not in a dominating fashion. Part of that is the simple lack of enthusiasm. The crowd was subdued, and the players showed very little emotion. If we're going to be a perennial Top 10 team from the G5, we need a LOT of swagger. And CCS needs to stress the style points. Winning isn't enough for G5, HOW you win is just as important. Compare our game to Miss St. v. LSU...

2. Penalties were ridiculous. Most of this is solvable, though. Half were false starts or motion, which may have been caused by trying to go too fast. The two defense calls on Senat and Sawtelle were legit, and would get called 9 times of ten. This is the second time for Senat. What this tells me is that the coaches aren't stressing discipline enough. It would be (somewhat) more acceptable if this was undiscipline caused by overzealousness (like the old U.Miami or Oakland Raiders), but it's not. If anything, we're playing under-zealous. No, these penalties seem to be simply from a lack of focus. (to be fair, the improvement in tackling is likely caused by a HUGE improvement in focus)

3. Blocking assignments on special teams are atrocious. This is certainly fixable, but it's one of those "little things" that really deduct style points. And if we don't fix it, it's going to lose us some games down the stretch.

4. Running was the best all year, but still not where we should be (Illinois defense is the youngest in the league), but passing is still questionable. Sure, Q's stats suffered from 4-5 drops, but he also flat out missed 4-5 receivers. According to one of the TV announcers, it could be more on footwork than anything else. Which gets us right back to coaching. One comment the announcer made is that CCS said he was going to make Q into an NFL-style QB. Not sure where he got the quote from, but it seems like a bad idea from a USF standpoint, even if it might be a plus for Q (and for future recruiting efforts)

While I still have a lot of lingering anger from our inability to step up and dominate in the fashion we were expected to (and should have done), which caused us to drop in the polls, I admit that the sky is not falling, and this team has the chance to have a very special season.

Just really ticks me off that we could still have been in the running for the natty, and Q in the running for the Heismann, but CCS' too-conservative play, and the lack of discipline, has knocked us backwards. Maybe we can make up the lost ground, maybe not. But we CAN get a lot better than what I've seen so far. Ceiling is very high for this team.

Go Bulls!!

P.S. Pass the salt...

 

Nice post Charsibb...I agree with all four points. #2 and #3 are spot on. 

[Triple B]

1 hour ago, NewEnglandBull said:

Compare our game to Miss St. v. LSU..

1 hour ago, charsibb said:

One comment the announcer made is that CCS said he was going to make Q into an NFL-style QB. Not sure where he got the quote from

..... Mack Brown got the quote from Lovie, not CCS. Illinois wanted to try and keep Q in the pocket and not be able to create havoc outside of it .... Mack also said they weren't succeeding.