- Sep 9, 2014
- 5,193
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No doubt, they are a good team with very good athletes so it will be a challenge. And we have our issues for sure.Lol ... we can't stop the run. We can't run. All those words you wrote might be true, or close to it, but it's all outward looking. Look inward with the same degree of study you did on AU and you might see some troubling things. There are so many questions going into this game.
Their strength on D is the defensive line, particularly run defense and causing fumbles. And very true that our running game has been anemic, although a little better in the 4th Q so maybe our revamped S&C is paying off? So it looks like strength vs weakness, right? Maybe not. Hopefully Mullen doesn't go Chimp-ball and demand to bang our head against the wall repeatedly by insisting on inside runs 2 out of 3 downs in the first half. Odds are we aren't going to beat them trying to out muscle them hat on hat in the run, game but that's not our strength against anyone.
Our strength is Trask finding the open man quickly and getting him the ball past their dominant D-line taking away their strength (DL) and exploiting ours (WR/TE). When we do run, hopefully it's mostly outside to make those big dudes run sideline to sideline. Hopefully some jet sweeps, reverses, and an option pitch or 2, etc.
And yes, we have given up a lot of yards on the ground, and this will be the best running attack we have faced. But our defense will be full strength and it has already been pretty good keeping folks out of the endzone and causing TO's so again, maybe not as much of a strength vs weakness as it appears from first glance.
I'd love to see our offense score first possession and have the D cause an early TO to get the swamp in a frenzy from the get-go and take full advantage of home field advantage. If we can grab momentum from the start that's going to be big.
In the end, who the hell knows what's going to happen, but I like our chances.