Self scouting

[SaltyBulls]

Through my coaching experience I have found that it equally important, if not more important, to scout my own players and play calling tendencies as it is to scout the other teams.  It shows me if there are tendencies in my pitch selection or offensive decisions that the other teams may notice and be able to game plan for.  I know for sure that we are not doing this as an offensive coaching staff and it doesn't appear that it is being done on the defensive side of the ball either. 

What I notice on offense, as a casual fan, is that the offense moves the football and is efficient when we spread the defense out throwing quick routes and WR screens.  This then opens up the inside run.  However, Coach Gilbert continues to call the game in the reverse of this.  He tries to use the inside run to open up the passing game, then when the passing game opens the inside run, we go back to running it until it doesn't work any more again.  This is why we fall behind every game (offense doesn't do anything early because we run the HB dive 80% of the time), then come back (we start passing because we are behind), and then either fight to the finish or lose like Saturday (because the passing game opened the inside run and Gilbert falls back in love with it until it doesn't work anymore again). 

It seems so obvious to me and I assume the majority of the fan base.  It baffles me how a Coach of Strongs ability and history does not notice this.  We talk about the players being young and inexperienced.  However, this coaching staff is not young or inexperienced.  I could understand if the players were making mistakes but I can not accept mistakes from a coaching staff that is experienced and should be doing a better job of getting its players ready.  Injuries and inexperience are not excuses for poor coaching.  

[DELdaBull]

We do not scout.

[JTrue]

Fire CCS!

[Bull Dozer]

I dunno how much of the defenses problems are due to self scouting as much as it is a combination of being young and lacking depth at key positions.  

As for the offense, I've been beating the self scouting drum since last season.  Gilbert is just going to run his offense no matter what the defense does to counter it.  I can't remember the last time we called a play that went against our obvious situational tendencies and caught the defense overselling against those tendencies and it resulted in a big play.    I think the lack of creativity in the playcalling is directly responsible for our struggles in the red zone as well as other key situations.....   

Edited October 31, 2018 by Bull Dozer

[jchem1995]

Salty you hit nail on the head. No coaching. I said in another post tackling on defense is fundamental. We don’t even coach fundamentals. Arrogance will bite you in the ass and our coaching staff feels they are better ( you know because they did coach at Texas). 

[jchem1995]

Think about this 57 points scored against us and it wasn’t under Skip, Willie, Chris Cosh, or Chuck. 

[Apis Bull]

24 minutes ago, jchem1995 said:

Salty you hit nail on the head. No coaching. I said in another post tackling on defense is fundamental. We don’t even coach fundamentals. Arrogance will bite you in the ass and our coaching staff feels they are better ( you know because they did coach at Texas). 

I get what you're saying about tackling, but if you've gotten to this level and don't tackle properly, you probably never will.

[usf97]

Just a thought....has USF ever had what you would consider a "Good" Offensive Coordinator? I don't think so. 

These guys know with our schedule and the talent pool here in Florida, that if they just recruit half way decent, you will win-7-10 games a year just out-talenting the other team regardless of what Offense run. 

Rod Smith seemed like an Okay OC. 

Greg Gregory

Mike Canales

Todd Fitch

David Reaves 

Sterlin Gilbert

Think of all of our signature wins. Maybe Pitt 2001' or TCU 2004' were because of our offense. 

[BDYZR]

The whole problem, as I see it, is execution. IF the play is executed to perfection, it works. However, look at 3rd and long for instance. Everybody knows that's a passing down. That's why the comment, "They're pinning their ears back and coming..." is used so often. That's why when everybody knows what play is coming there's no hesitation by the defense. They know to crash the middle of the line. Now you have 5 o-linemen that MUST know where 5-7 guys on defense are AND execute their respective assignments.

Wouldn't it be awesome to see a true play-action pass on one of those hb-dives?

[SaltyBulls]

To the best of my knowledge, we have ran a HB dive on the first play of every game so far this season.  Maybe Gilbert is just setting up UCF for that play action pass at the end of the season to start the game and throw a TD.  We can only hope...