Texas-Wyoming Post-Mortem: Longhorn Offense

I know it’s difficult in the first week to get a great fix on any team, but what was you opinion of the team we played?

I guess one way to rank Wyo would be compare them to New Mexico and maybe Iowa State. The former is generally awful while the later can threaten to (or actually) win every once in awhile.

Very much enjoyed the read.

Davis has changed. It might take him winning a game for us before some start giving him the benefit of the doubt accorded to other players, but he’s on board IMO.

If we know movement is the forte of the offense line & not power, is there a technical or philosophical reason why we don’t start the game with more movement as opposed to starting with power against a fresh unit?

We started with power and inside zone work because you have to start with something, and we might as well see if our bread and butter play can gain some traction against Wyo. You don’t want to start the game by having your back blown up in the backfield after a defensive linemen shoots a gap or gums things up for pulling linemen. We tried that nice little flip 90 action off the sweep motion with two pulling linemen in the second series and the Cowboys had none of it. Sometimes you have to put a little more bait on the hook and let the defense nibble a bit before you jerk the hook.

And Wyoming had done their film work. They were waiting on us for our double pass to Shipley and our early inside running plays. Give Espy some credit. I believe he helped wall off the right side of the defense on Bergeron’s big run.

our interior OL would be stronger physically in the first half. Given our lack of strong ancillary blockers, it’d be nice to be able to pound the ball up the middle with Inside Zone.
We might even be worse off than last year with Berryhill and Berryhill gone but it’s way too early to say that.

Grant looks solid, Daniels and Matthews look decent, and there’s a lot we can do on the edge until teams wear down inside. Really encouraged by Monroe’s play.

Ditto on being pleased with our ball-control. If we can get Fera healthy and actually convert field goals we can win a lot of games by holding the ball for 30+ minutes converting during our occasional forays into the red zone.

Thought we saw a lot of improvement where it was most needed—QB and OT. Monroe looked like an early Gaskamp leader. Nice to have an OC who will use his abilities instead of just talking about it.

I thought Ash was good. The downfield routes were there and he recognized them, the timing was just off. I think he’ll be fine with a little more game time and film.

The only thing on offense that bothers me is the lack of strength in the middle of the line. That’s it.

The 82 yd TD was a total fluke (I know this isn’t a defense thread…). Combine that with two missed field goals and all of a sudden we could easily looking at 43-10 and a lot less anxiety in the fanbase. Not to mention that Brett Smith is a freaking baller and extended a couple of WYO drives that kept our offense off the field and thus not able to score more points.

Most Satisfied: QB, RB, OT
Ash though not great, he was a firm good. I would like to see more yards per attempt, but all he needs to do for that was hit one of the deep balls and maybe 2 more intermediate plays. The RBs all looked good. It is the strength of the offense. Maybe I am wrong but it looked to me like the OTs outperformed the guards/centers on Saturday. Part of the success of outside running was due to misdirection/constraint, but in each I saw an OT or (gasp!) a TE setting the edge. I think the TEs did better in the run game then pass game. I didn’t ever see any of the tackles pancaked by a defender like I did a few guards, so I give them the nod.

Most Concerned: OG/C, WR, TE
As I said above, there were several occasions where the center and a guard ended the play on their backs. Combine that with the inability to run inside early and I have concern. I know Wyo’s strength was their DTs but I supposed strength was our guards. Wyoming won that battle when played straight up. I liked what I saw of Shipley and most of what I saw from Davis, but their wasn’t much else. Most of the time when Ash dropped back to pass it looked like it was hard for him to find someone open. That caused his throwaways and several of the scrambles. I don’t know what the answer is but most of our 157 yards was on screens and RB screens and swings. Only improvement in our WRs will improve that. TEs didn’t really do anything in the passing game but I did see some good blocks in the outside running game. So put them as a concern but saw some good there.

Already ready to watch another one.

"Individually, I watched Dominic Espinosa quite a bit. He struggled at the point of attack a couple of times, particularly when big Mike Purcell was still feeling frisky in the first quarter…"

Can’t disagree with this generally, but do have to note that there was at least one play in the first quarter (at the 8:51 mark) where it appeared that Espinosa got flat-out blown up by Purcell, but in fact Mason Walters tripped coming around behind the center and Purcell simply pushed Espinosa over Walters, who was laying directly behind him. It looks like Purcell blew Espinosa back on his butt, but that’s not what happened at all.

If our passing game is going to mostly consist of run-complementary stuff like screens and occasional downfield lobs then we don’t necessarily need an all-around receiver like Mike Davis.
Sanders can push for playing time if he’s a willing blocker, can run and catch a post or fade, and can make something happen with the ball in his hands.

Really liked what I saw from Goodwin, especially as a blocker.

It was a pleasant surprise when the 2 week old woke me up at 1:30 am to eat to see the post mortem. I got greedy and hoped the defense would be up for our 5:15 feeding, but alas, no such luck.

Also, it’s nice to see one of these written by an adult. Wading through all the bedwetters on the game thread, and the snap analysis from a lot of the morons on shaggy is a beat down. OMG- we will win 5-7 games, or this entire defense would be 3rd string in the 1983 defense, or ASH- not one bit better from last year rumble, grumble, rabble rabble.

I predicted 12 wins (counting bowl games) partly based on awesome defense (and btw we are 1 fourth and 1 stop, 1 fluke play and 1 horrible roughing call) from a shut out, none of the stuff I saw on defense was systematic.

Ash was GREATLY improved, made good decisions on all but one of his passes (first quarter), threw the ball away when he should, hit guys short in stride so they could run after the catch etc. OL was fine at pass protection and good enough for us to run for ~300.

Oh, and OU looked like hammered dogshit. Like, if they brought the game they played against UTEP against Wyoming they are probably 0-1. And their weakness- pass protection and stopping the running game- probably our two greatest strengths.

I suppose I could freak out about WVU putting up 70 on a team that routinely gives up 40 or 50 to the lame halt and weak of college football, or OSU scoring 84 against a mediocre 3A texas team (when Vegas installed them as a jaw dropping 60+ point favorite) but I’m content to note that we played the best OOC foe in the conference this week, never struggled one bit with them, and looked awesome in the 2nd and 3rd quarters.

All that said- Fera needs to get healthy or we are going to lose a game we shouldn’t. Every thing else about special teams was awesome.

Thanks again for all you do.

however it bears repeating. Ash was 20 of 27.

If true that 2 or 3 were catchable, but dropped and another 2 or 3 were wisely thrown away, then Ash had at most 2 or 3 bad throws.

Does that sound accurate? If yes, that’s a VERY good 1st game of season for a true soph QB. Granted, we’re not talking about a top-rated secondary. Still, damn good showing by Ash and smart game planning to build confidence in a young QB. If Ash hits a rough spot in a future game, coaches & players can now point back to this game and tell Ash, “Look, you were very efficient and accurate then. No reason you can’t do it now.”

I thought the fumble was on Espinosa. Looked like the snap went wide, Ash made a stab at it and the ball ricocheted off him.

What did it look like on replay? Did I see something that wasn’t there on that play?

While he had a high completion percentage and didn’t throw any picks, 5.6 YPA against a defense like Wyoming is pretty depressing. Obviously, not all of this is on Ash, as we only really have one dependable receiver in Shipley, although I liked what I saw from Jackson. I’m surprised we didn’t see Harris, as I think he can be a dependable, big body guy that’s useful on those 6-15 yard routes, which is preferable to what we’re seeing from Magic Mike at this point.

However, It feels like the coaches still don’t trust Ash with more difficult routes and our passing offense will be limited to the more remedial screens with an occasional PA pass. While we’ll certainly be better than last year (we have no excuse for not being so), I’m not sure if the kind of performance we saw on Saturday will be what is needed to win 10+ and challenge for the Big 12 crown.

From this first weekend, I’m expecting OU to be an incredibly ugly, 2009-esque slap fight. WVU, while we’ll be able to slow them down somewhat, will still move the ball and score on this defense, and I’m not sure if we’ll be able to hold serve. KSU will be KSU.

I was expecting more from this team, but maybe that wasn’t quite fair. I thought we could make the leap to a team that was ready to win the Big 12, but that may still be a year away. I still think we can win 9 or 10 games, but anything more is dependent on some rapid improvement on both sides of the ball. I think that’s coming on defense, but I’m afraid we may not have the horses yet on offense.