Post Game Chatter: The ULM Game
by Paul Crewe on Nov 14, 2010 10:33 AM CST
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PrintWell, that was that. There's really not much else to say about it. It just was. LSU didn't play perfectly, but they didn't play poorly either. Defense was spectacular. Offense continued to struggle. Special Teams looked great. I'm in the camp that you can hardly take much away from these games. I think the coaching staff wanted to use this game to further iron out kinks in the passing game. It didn't work. Both QBs were woeful. Neither was accurate. Both were missing their targets. And this time, unlike the McNeese game, the pass protection wasn't miserable (sans one or two plays).
This many games into the season I think it's safe to say that it's not that we don't have a passing game at all... we just don't have a deep passing game. And because we don't have a deep passing game, it makes it so much easier for defenses to just sit on the short routes and limit us. Theoretically with our running game and underneath passing threats (Shepard, on bubble screens, namely), we should open up a world of deep throws, but it just doesn't happen. Regardless, let's recap the high points of the night after the jump.
-Defensively, we were the Mac truck and they were the fly. It was pretty apparent early on that they had very little shot to contend. The defense came to play, which was nice to see. I was happy that the team didn't come in in letdown mode after a big win and just kinda go through the motions and pull it out with talent. ULM isn't a great team, but they are a sneaky one with some talent. Put them away early and then get your young guys some experience.
-One of the announcers mentioned last night that we've played a total of 20 freshman, either true or redshirt. And not just in the conventional "oh they have a load of freshman on special teams" type of way. Sure, we have that too. But these guys have all been major contributors in big games: Tyrann Mathieu, Eric Reid, Sam Montgomery, Barkevious Mingo, Craig Loston, Tharold Simon, Ronnie Vinson, Kevin Minter, Lamin Barrow, Tahj Jones, Chris Faulk, Kadron Boone, James Wright, and Spencer Ware. Never underestimate what this means for the future of the team. Namely, next season when some of these guys are asked to expand their roles, they will have actual game experience. That's huge.
-I've maintained for a while that a two-QB system is the way to go, but I'm beginning to abandon that notion. Thank Jarrett Lee for what he's done, but these past four weeks we see why he's still the backup. He's giving us very little right now. Not that I'm particularly overwhelmed by Jefferson's play in any game but the Alabama game, but he does offer the added dimension of mobility and for a ball-control offense like ours, that's important.
-We are stacked at running back, and the rich get richer next season with the additions of Jeremy Hill and Kenny Hilliard.
-It's truly unfortunate we lost Sam Montgomery for the season. However, Lavar Edwards is playing some very good football of late. That guy is a very, very good end.
-Greg Shaw has stepped in at RT and hasn't missed a beat. Impressive. Will Blackwell has started practicing again, and Hurst should return at some point this year. If we could finish the season with the OL we hoped to start with, that would be ideal. Oh, and while Ben Jones will probably be 1st team All SEC, I expect PJ's name to be on that list in short order. He's terrific.
-It feels like it's been forever since we just beat the tar out of someone.
-Overall, we did what we had to do: took care of business. No injuries to worry about. No close game to complain about (even if the offense was porous). Just show up, do work and go home. This team is playing with swagger and energy that we haven't seen the past two seasons. I'm a big believer in momentum and what it does for teams during the college football season. One loss often takes superior teams to a miserable season (see Texas). One win can cause less talented teams to play above their heads. This happens all the time. We're riding high right now, and next week, we need to bring that same attitude and swagger and take down an opponent that we realistically should put away early and easily.
Ole Miss has been our foil the past couple of season's and many believe Nutt has Miles' number. However, they are coming off a thrashing from Tennessee which will very likely render them out of bowl season (unless they are able to upset both us and State). However, I expect the team to be repeatedly reminded of their previous losses and to step up and play well against them.
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agree with most of your post
but disagree with you about Lee. He needs to keep playing. You’re right, he hasn’t been great, but we know there is a constant potential for JJ to go off a cliff. We need Lee to be available then. Without JJ we lose several other games- but it’s equally true for Lee. Between the two of them we have about 3/4 of a good college QB. With either one it’s more like 1/2.
Defense looked awesome. Running game was reasonably solid.
I really like that Les plays backups and freshmen a lot in these games rather than trying to run the score up. We could have kept the pressure on in the 4th quarter and tried to score 3 more times (cough cough Wisconsin) but Les isn’t like that.
Yeah, you are probably right
I’m just not seeing what Lee is giving us that JJ is not. He was jump starting the passing game his first few appearances, but JJ has even improved his passing lately, and out performed Lee the past two weeks (though not well last night at all).
I'm a Lee camper, but
I have to stick with my same logic. Lee has not bee n good lately and I don’t like the 2 qb system so Lee should sit. BUT in this system that means banished as there is no hot-hand system in reality. I still think with our backs we would do better with Lee full time to threaten deep, but 10 games in ain’t the time to change.
"The gifts that I'm given by that team were in their preparation, how they come to work everyday, how they are committed to the team, how they step onto the field and do hard things. They play violent football at risk of injury for their team and for their school. The gift that I'm given is to be allowed to be on the sideline with them and coach them." Les Miles
by ZimmZimmZalaBimm on Nov 14, 2010 1:19 PM CST up reply actions
If we're going to go the way of abbreviated passing routes
And not throw any deep balls, i don’t really see the need to play Lee as much. Throwing screens and slants and relying on our receivers to make plays doesn’t need a 2 QB system. Jefferson can make those short throws with enough accuracy to give the receivers a fighting chance to do good things.
still think Lee needs playing time
we have two not very good QBs. From game to game there is really NO way to tell which one will play even adequately. JJ should start and do his little designed runs. But he’s certainly no better at intermediate routes than Lee is. They both stink at them. I actually think we’re probably a little better off going deep more – they seem to throw the ball better deep. But in a number of games the Oline hasn’t given them time to do that.
Pdrew – we’ve been trying to throw screens and slants all year – JJ sucks at it. He’s really, really bad at throwing screens. That’s one area where Lee is clearly better than him.
But the real issue is that there is no way to tell which one will show up. Will we get the good Lee of the UF game? The good JJ of the Bama game? The bad Lee and JJ of XYZ game? No way to know – so you play both.
It's not the QB's...
it’s Gary. J Lee had two TD’s dropped. One to Randle and one to Toliver. Both would have been decent catches but this isn’t high school. Randle short armed one on JJ too. We almost never see the sort of catches the GA WR’s (not just Green) were making for Murray. Our receivers are very inconsistent – downright ordinary. Our o-line is inconsistent in protection and the QB’s are inconsistent and lack confidence. Can you blame them after you figure points one and two. Put it all together and the chance of something going wrong with at least one of them on any particular play is pretty good. The result is we have a pass game that sucks. This has been the case for three years. Gary is the OC and man who designs the pass game. He needs to go. There are teams with QB’s no better than ours getting much better results. The fact that we have been pretty successful getting it done in the pass game against good teams in the clutch tells you it’s not talent. There’s just no overall focus, no sense of urgency, nothing you can count on. It took a whole half in the Bama game to figure out that they were not going to play man, even though anybody who looked at film of the LSU-Florida and LSU-AU games would come out against LSU in zone on D. Nicky watches film. The problem is Gary – and his grab bag system does not help either.
It gets old to read the amount of blame the QB’s take constantly – both of them. The more I watch this O the more I firmly believe that if you put any QB in the SEC into this system with the exception of Newton, and maybe Murray, they’d suck too. Do you really think Garcia or Simms or Relf or whoever would thrive in this cluster of a pass game?
If we don’t get rid of GC Mettenberger will be the next guy we sign who looks lousy. Count on it.
by pttigris on Nov 14, 2010 3:37 PM CST up reply actions 1 recs
Gary certainly doesn't help..
But Lee hasn’t played well. He’s been fortunate to have only one INT thus far as he’s thrown multiple passes into defender’s hands, including one last night, I believe.
There were some drops, for sure. I agree on most of your points.
One thing I’ve noticed about Mettenberger, if you watch his spring game highlights, is he’s really skilled with ball fakes and has great footwork. Neither of our current guys do that really, and that’s partially on Gary.
I don’t see how GC survives this season, though.
i agree that Crowton sucks - but
so have the QBs.
And although the WR as a whole have dropped a lot of passes – this game aside, Randle has been money. He’s caught everything in his zipcode – he is a great talent. TT on the other hand drops all kinds of passes and RS can’t catch ANYTHING.
Part of that however is JJ’s throws. Almost all of his throws are off. They are either too hard- on short throws, to high, behind the WR, or way to long (on deep throws). Sometimes he combines several of these problems together.
Crowton needs to go. Who coaches our wide outs? That person needs a kick in the behind. And we need either an OC who can coach QBs or a dedicated QB coach
What worries me about Lee...
Is it hasn’t been good Lee/Bad Lee sorta thing. It’s been an okay game vs. Tennessee, a great game against Florida and poor since.
Have teams now seen enough film on him and know how to play him? How can dice up Florida’s defense (which is solid) and then do nothing since…
i agree but
JJ did the same thing. He was terrible for over a month and then snapped out of it a bit. The coaches stuck with him and I think they will (and should) stick with Lee.
TC
It was good to see him in the game.
It sucked he wasn’t allowed to pass
"The second Patrick Peterson puts on an NFL uniform, Darrelle Revis becomes the 2nd best corner in the league."-Herm Edwards
I totally agree.
I was very happy when I saw TC line up at QB. We in the student section started chanting to let him pass the ball. Also, I was very disappointed with our offense. The Running game wasn’t that spectacular and the passing game was less than mediocre. However, I do foresee great things for the future of this team. Our underclassmen in the secondary are playing spectacularly and our defensive line is looking very bright with anthony johnson coming in next year as well as Barkevious Mingo and others playing very well. We don’t have a lot of rotation at the linebackers, but when the underclassmen were playing, they stepped up as they needed to. Our RB’s are playing well, but could be playing better if the O-line was giving them a little bit more push and opening up bigger holes. Basically, our running game isn’t giving us consistent yardage, but does get us very good yardage every few plays. As far as QB’s go, eh. With some new guys coming in to play next year in Stephen Rivers and hopefully Zach Mettenberger and possibly a few other guys like Teddy Bridgewater and Jacoby Brissett, it seems like we will be pretty stacked at the position for the next 3-4 years hopefully.
I know.
I was in on the chant too
"The second Patrick Peterson puts on an NFL uniform, Darrelle Revis becomes the 2nd best corner in the league."-Herm Edwards
by WatsonTiger on Nov 14, 2010 12:41 PM CST up reply actions
Lamin Barrow
This guy was VISCIOUS when he was on the field on ST and LB, he didn’t just hold his own but asserted himself strongly. I really liked what I saw from him. Baker and Francois will look to be anchors on the outside next year, so I think the rotation could remain strong. Tahj looks to have put on good weight as well. What’s left to see is the rotation at the Mike.
by alange on Nov 14, 2010 1:13 PM CST via mobile up reply actions
"-It feels like it's been forever since we just beat the tar out of someone."
I made the same comment last night to a group of friends. The last GOOD team that we really hammered was Ohio State…No, I don’t count Georgia Tech.
Minor quibble
“One loss often takes superior teams to a miserable season (see Texas). One win can cause less talented teams to play above their heads. "
Texas hasn’t suffered one loss that hurt, they flat out suck. And we’re not playing over our heads, although I don’t think you were in implying that about us.
I know Texas isn't good...
But they aren’t THIS bad and that was my point. They lost to UCLA, likely overlooked them heading into OU weekend. Lost to OU and that pretty much tanked their season.
I don't know if you've payed attention
And I’m pretty sure you have as I love LOVE reading what you write here. but Texas has overlooked no one or tanked, they just flat out suck and have been exposed as such by any decent team they face.
And Texas is indeed THIS bad. That just doesn’t apply when Texas has been getting their pants beat off of them and the score reflects what just happened on the field.
Ole Miss has been our foil the past couple of season’s and many believe Nutt has Miles’ number. However, they are coming off a thrashing from Tennessee which will very likely render them out of bowl season (unless they are able to upset both us and State). However, I expect the team to be repeatedly reminded of their previous losses and to step up and play well against them.
I think they only have to win one of LSU or MSU to become bowl eligible. But I’m lazy and not looking at ratings, just going off a memory of a Team Speed Kills article last week.
______________________________________________
I will give my North Carolina for Tennessee Today. Apparently.
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