Difficulties with the AU Offense

CrimsonForce said:

First of all, you can't just say, Well if you take away their big plays then we shut them down. That is true for any team in any game. Those big plays are normally set up with a lot of game planning leading up to the game and then using other plays to set up the big plays during the game. Can't just throw those out.

Second, and more importantly, I still think we are in the midst of changing (I hope) defensive philosophies, somewhat. On all the big pass plays NM just dropped straight back, sat in his "spot" and launched rockets down the field with no pressure at all. When we got a push up front (mainly with the second half adjustments of Evans and Williams) NM was not able to stand back there like a statue and launch the ball downfield. Back to my original point, it doesn't look like we have changed defensive pressure philosophy as much as I thought we had. It looks like our defensive scheme is to just keep the defensive lineman in their rush lanes and push the pocket - not necessarily pressure the QB. I think we will continue have problems until we put in our true pass rush guys (Evans, Williams, Hand etc) to not only put more pressure on the QB with the front 4 but also to keep contain on the edge plays. Lake and Ivory were in quite a bit last night, and nothing against those guys, but IMO they don't have any business playing a lot of snaps against HUNH teams. Most plays they would just stand up and lean on the offensive lineman - no push at all. Lake and Ivory are very good against teams like Arkansas and LSU - pro style teams, not the fastball teams.

Last point, Gus is a really good offensive coach. AU has had great talent on that side of the ball pretty consistently since 2010. With NM, Coates, CAP, and Duke, it doesn't really matter what offense you are running. It's more about the personnel than the scheme they are running. When Chris Todd was the starter at AU they were horrible..

Click to expand...

Hooks4bama said:

It's hard to run 40yd deep streaks from the red zone. That is their bread and butter. Shear speed and hail mary like passing.

Click to expand...

tusks_n_raider said:

Last nights issue was what I feared if you had watched AU play much this year. They have been the masters of throwing 50/50 hail mary jump balls to Coates and Williams. Both are huge and Coates and huge AND fast. All of our secondary players are shorter and have had the worst time looking for and playing the ball.

I figured that AU would make some hay on that but just not to the degree that they did. I give the D big credit for tightening up in the redzone and forcing turnover on downs and the Perry INT.....But man LOOK at their yardage. Even in the 2nd half they were still completing those bomb jump balls.

It was just a bad mismatch of their sasquatch WR's against our smaller CB's. As far as I know Mizzou, Oregon, OSU, TCU, and Baylor don't have 2 Lurtches at WR like that.

Click to expand...