A Tale of Two Halfs

I am writing this as an attempt to put together my thoughts and the seeming thoughts of the rest of the Rebel nation on our game yesterday. I think is best to analyze the game from the perspective of each position in the first and second half. I was disappointed in several things in the game, yet there are also a few positives that can be gleaned from the game. This will not necessarily be a statistical analysis but more an attempt at capturing how the positional play was.

First Half:

Offense:

-Quarterbacks: Stanley was great in the first half throwing for 3 touchdowns. He also completed over a hundred yards passing while efficiently managing our offense, and giving good hand-offs to our running backs. His only blemish in the first half was the quirk of a fumble that turned into a touchdown. Masoli looked fairly good also, making several great passes, good hand-offs, and several exciting runs of his own.

-Offensive Line: The offensive line looked okay on pass protection but let the pocket collapse a couple times forcing the QB to scramble or get sacked. Our run blocking needs a lot of work, we had a few good run blocks were we opened up noticeable holes in the middle but for the most part we dropped blocking assignments or did not block aggressively enough.

-Running backs: Brandon Bolden and Enrique Davis saw the bulk of the carries a made some decent runs moving the ball up the field especially with Masoli in the game. Enrique even got his first touchdown this year on a 1 yard rush in the second quarter. Rodney Scott even got in a few yards rushing late in the 2nd quarter.

-Wide Receivers: Melvin Harris, Markeith Summers, and Jesse Grandy all racked up touchdown catches with passes from Nathan Stanley. They showed good hands and ran good routes. Ja-mes Logan also had a good catch in the first quarter. Even though I know this was against an FCS defense I am glad our receivers had a good showing.

-Tight Ends: Ferbia Allen was the only tight end to get offensive action in the first half as the favorite target of passes from Jeremiah Masoli. He showed sure hands and the ability to block on some runs.

Defense:

-Defensive Line: Jerrell Powe, Ted Laurent, Damien Jackson, and company made good pushes on the Jax State O-line. Jerrell aslo recorded a tackle for loss on a rush by plowing through the o-line to rap up the running back. They helped stifle the running game and put some pressure on the QB.

-Linebackers: Jonathan Cornell and Allen Walker made a great showing in the first half. They demoralized the running game by plugging the holes and several times getting to the RB in the backfield. The also helped in stopping the passing game by giving good support to the secondary.

-Secondary: Johnny Brown, Marcus Temple, and Joel Kight helped to keep the passing game to minimal gains and at times shut down the receivers in the first half.

Special Teams:

-Kickers: Byron Rose was perfect in the first half making every PAT and his lone field goal. Andrew Ritter hit several booming kickoffs one of which went 70 yards and went clear through the back of the end zone before hitting the turf.

-Kick Returners: Derrick Herman, Jesse Grandy, and H.R. Greer each made fairly good returns for an average of 12 yards between the three of them. Jesse Grandy made the longest return at 17 yards off of a punt.

-Kickoff Coverage: Our tackling needs some work here. We had several broken tackles that allowed the Jax State returner to gain extra yardage.

Coaches:

-Offense: Nutt mixed the passing and running games effectively to move the ball up the field and score.

-Defense: Nix kept enough pressure on the QB to force some bad passes and other quick passes. He also dialed up some good run stopping plays.

Overall:

The first half was great with just a few blemishes to be worked out.

Second Half:

Offense:

-Quarterbacks: Nathan Stanley's only series of the second half saw a heavy emphasis on the run with his only completed pass fumbled by Jesse Grandy and recovered by Jax State. Jeremiah Masoli also had to deal with the conservative run emphasis, but seemed to deal with this better and  turned some broken plays into good gains.He also spread the ball around a little more in the few passes he threw. The only noticeable bad mark was his one interception that was thrown a little to high and went through the receivers outstretched hands.

-Offensive Line: Our offensive line seem to lack a little of the aggressiveness they showed in the first half and let several running plays collapse before they had a chance to develop. This can not happen if we are going to run the ball against SEC defenses.

-Running Backs: Brandon Bolden had several great runs in the second half, shacking several tackles. Yet, he also had several runs were he got stopped for minimal gain. Enrique Davis had several good runs and one great 23 yard run. He also caught a pass for a 16 yard gain. Rodney Scott was not much of a rushing factor in the second half usually only gaining 1 or 2 yards at a time, some of this is due to poor blocking by the o-line. Devin Thomas' only rush attempt was for no gain. Jeff Scott did good running for a 12 yard carry.

-Wide Receivers: Julian Whitehead caught a 4 yard pass. Markieth Summers also caught a 14 yard pass. Aside from these few plays our receivers were a non-factor in the second half due to the heavy run emphasis.

Defense:

I will just say that overall our defense was not even good. Our defensive line was not aggressive at going after the quarterback and usually only saw 3 on the line. We also allowed several huge gaps to be open for big runs and were unable to stop several short yardage gains. The secondary was bleed the entire second half. We stayed in a zone-prevent defense and allowed receivers to get behind the coverage too many times. The secondary looked lost on several plays and I saw last second shifting off coverage due to someone not picking up a receiver and having to move to pick up the new person leaving a gap in coverage.

Special Teams:

-Kickers: Byron Rose continued to do a good job and build confidence making another field goal. Andrew Ritter had some more huge kickoffs, including another 70-yarder. Tyler Campbell also made a 31 yard punt.

-Kick Returners: Jeff Scott made a spectacular 40 yard return (I hope we use him more because he is exciting to watch rushing and returning). He also made several other large gains in the return game. Derrick Herman had a decent 14 yard return. Jesse Grandy did not gain any yardage on his 2nd half return.

-Kickoff/Punt Coverage: Again we saw some problems with wrapping up and making tackles. But we were able to maintain containment which is good.

Coaches:

-Offense: Nutt needs to save the conservative running game for when our o-line can consistently open holes in the middle. The second half offensive play calling was way too conservative and needed a better emphasis on at least a moderate passing game, even a few quick slants would have been okay.

-Defense: Nix did not make any changes in the defensive scheme allowing the quick throws to be completed, while opting for a prevent defense. He should have gotten more aggressive like the defense was in the first half. It is his job to ensure that the defenses aggressive mindset does not shut off.

Overtime:

Offense: We became more aggressive offensively which allowed Lionel Breaux to catch two 16 yard passes from Masoli. Our running game also put more emphasis on sweeps and runs to the outside instead of up the middle, which allowed us to score fairly well.

Defense: Continued its second half trend of dropping off of coverage in the secondary and not being aggressive in getting after the QB and putting enough pressure their. This is why they were confident enough to go for the 2 point conversion and the win, because we did not stop the pass.

So overall I think a few good things we saw is that as long as our offense remained aggressive and allowed a decent amount of passes we scored and moved the ball easily. Andrew Ritter is destroying the ball on kick-offs. Jeff Scott is exciting, Nathan Stanley is an efficient quarterback, and Masoli can turn broken plays into good gains. Brandon Bolden and Enrique Davis can move the ball pretty well in the running game, especially if our o-line blocks well. Also our wide receivers had a good game. I mean we racked up 479 yards of offense despite our offense sputtering in the second half. Also an interesting fact is we did not get penalized the entire game, which is absolutely amazing and shows good discipline by our team, despite how many inexperienced players we are playing. So even though we had a tough loss, we can still get some good out of it.

Hotty Toddy and lets turn this season around.