Image: Georgiadogs.com
UGA beat the Blazers 34-0 and delivered its first back to back shutouts since 1980. But that doesn't tell the broader story.
It seems that we have rarely perform very well in these early season, early afternoon match-ups against small-time non-conference opponents. There were obvious execution problems in this game around the offensive line, dumb penalties and wide receiver drops, but the team did what it needed to do to beat UAB soundly.
When you compare our stats from the 2003 game to yesterday's game, some interesting info comes to light:
| Score | 34-0 | 16-13 |
| TotalOffense | 271 | 337 | PassingYards | 125 | 223 |
| RushingYards | 146 | 116 |
| Turnovers | 0 | 2 |
| Rushing Yards Allowed | 68 | 101 |
| Passing Yards Allowed | 95 | 97 |
| UGA Penalties | 9-70 | 6-53 |
First off, Stafford didn't turn the ball over. He had some bad snaps, and he got the hell knocked out of him once in coughing up the ball. But the other guys didn't gain possession of it. That's improvement versus last week's 3 INTs. Greene was a three year starter in 2003, and he threw two interceptions against these guys.
Secondly, we were dominating on defense against a UAB. They never reached the UGA redzone, and they only crossed our 45 yardline once.
Third, as medicore (or worse) as our offensive line looked yesterday; we still posted better rushing stats than the 2003 game.
Cutting down on penalties and motivating our offensive line to play at a more consistent level are fixable problems. The offense looked sluggish yesterday, but we still did enough against a team capable of giving us a scare to win big.
Other than Stafford torching those guys for 250+ yards, I don't think it could've gone much better.
By the way, UAB is and might be the best team we face until Tennessee comes to town. Even if they aren't the best team we face til then, they aren't noticably worse. That's a sad statement on how bad Mississippi State, Colorado, South Carolina and Ole Miss really are.
pwd
7 comments:
Nice work. I am beginning to think I will be unfairly disappointed if our D gives up any more points until at least the UT game. Still not sure how WKU scored on offense.
Backups. On WKU's touchdown, we had most of our first string secondary in, but we had put in most of the backups on the line and linebackers by then.
Although you are right about MSU, we don't play them after UT.
..until after UT.
D'oh.
yep. MSU is after Vandy and before UF.
My bad. But they still suck.
The only way this Colorado game is competitive is if Ralphie plays...both ways.
I'd like to see the average starting field position stat. I think that would partially explain our low offensive yardage. It seemed like we averaged getting the ball just outside the 50 while our field position wasn't nearly as good in 2003. Also, I think time of possession improved.
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