Other than some coverage miscommunications and a few more missed tackles, it's difficult to be critical of Saturday's performance. The offense looked sharp and focused on almost every play. Knowshon put on another show, highlighted by his game of leapfrog.Stafford made some more great throws and was never under much pressure. He tried to force a few throws, just like last week, and a few throws were just too hot to be caught. Overall, though, his percentage was high and he hit a deep ball to MoMass. I thought the offensive line blocked well all day, benefiting from Boling's return. Central Michigan's defense offered little fight. In fact, the offense was scoring so fast, the Georgia defense was wearing down from staying out on the field for so long. (Image: georgiadogs.com)
A few notes:
- The large inside presences of Jeff Owens and Kade Weston weren't missed Saturday. The run defense was stout. If you take away LeFevour's scrambles, Central Michigan had 40 yards of rushing.
- Michael Moore looked real good with five catches for 64 yards. What was so encouraging about Moore is that he was catching things over the middle in stride and fighting for yards after the catch. That type of receiving has been too rare lately.
- After watching the game, I thought we did a good job of minimizing penalties, but when I looked at the box score, UGA had nine penalties for 70 yards. That still has to improve.
- Cordy Glenn and Kiante Tripp looked really good yesterday. Both had big blocks to spring Knowshon on long gains.
Overall, it was a dominating performance against a legitimate D-1 opponent. Saturday, however, the scrimmages are over. We've looked good against two bad defenses. The Cocks may have lost to Vandy, but they have a legitimate defense. Ellis Johnson is a good coordinator and we tend to struggle against Carolina defenses. I get the feeling, though, that this team is different. There are just so many weapons on offense and Knowshon plays with a tenacity and fire that almost leads me to believe he can simply will first downs. There's still plenty of room for improvement, but the trend is clearly upward.
Quinton
13 comments:
You're right--lots of good and the good far outweighed the bad. But if I may offer a few items of concern, they would be these:
1) Offense: short yardage/goalline situations -- taking 3 downs to get a yard against CMU isn't a great sign when stouter SEC D-linemen loom ahead.
2) Defense: was it just me or was the pass rush not up to snuff? I don't mean on the quick stuff LeFevour threw, but on the plays when he looked to throw downfield. We seem to be lacking a Pollack/Moses/Johnson/Howard kind of pass rusher thus far in '08.
Thoughts?
In regards to the defense, and to be completely fair, almost all (if not all) other offensive lines are built around experience and big ol' senior and the occasional redshirt junior. GSU and CMU are no different. The pass rush did alright, nothing spectacular but with the loss of one of our experienced team leaders against a big and experienced line, the performance was adequate. Only once or twice on Saturday was I really wondering why Lefevour had so much time.
The secondary, on the other hand, does really worry me. I kept finding ways to excuse blown coverages, miscommunication, and all around sloppy play. But when it comes down to it, USC, UF, and Auburn all play this style of offense which is based around spreading the field and allowing probably mediocre wide receivers to be in a favorable match up against line backers who are used to stopping the run. Yes they were on the field for longer than they will be in any other game, yes it was hot, yes there was probably tons of inexperience, but when it boils down to it, 3 SEC games will come down to who can stop the other high power offense more times. I'm not ready to sign us up for 2 losses yet like some other people, but we do have alot to work on in the secondary.
The only thing that really concerns me is the inconsistency of the defensive backfield. Wide open receivers, no matter what the level of competition, are never excusable.
I think the pass rush will come. We rarely blitzed in either of the first two games. Yesterday, the front four always got a good push up field, but we might have been more concerned with containing LeFavour. I think you'll see a better pure pass rush this weekend against a pocket passer.
Lastly, we still blow tackles in the secondary. There were fewer of those yesterday, but there were still a handful. Against those powerful offenses, you've got to make those tackles.
#3 bryan evans had a really tough day in my opinion, on just about every postive CMU play he was the guy getting burned. concerns me against the spread teams.
My main concern was the lack of a pass rush. Lefevour had way to much time in the pocket at times. This will be an issue against SEC teams.
When things turned around last season, our pass rush became dominate. If you watched the UF/Miami game on saturday night, that's how UM kept it close. They were all over Tebow in the first half just like we were last year. I agree that the front 7 are playing the run very well, I would just like to see more of a push from the front 4. Think of the QB's we'll face this year (Smelly, Wilson, Crompton, Tebow, Hatch and whoever UA has to name a few). Put tons of pressure on these guys and we win going away. No pass rush and remember what Ainge did to us in Athens 2 yrs ago. Pressure on the QB is paramount in the SEC. I think CWM has figured that out, at least I hope so.
Just one mans opinion.
Let me add one more concern: kickoff defense. Starting field position has been way too good for our opponents thus far. I'm not wild about the directional approach, even when we keep it in bounds. I'm just not seeing the results. Why don't we just boom it deep into the endzone? Is Walsh, et al, not capable of doing this? Or are we afraid that this strategy makes us more vulnerable to the homerun? Surely, there's some way we could keep opponents from starting beyond their 30 yard line.
Anon 8:47,
I agree. Our kickoff coverage is positively wretched. Everything else about the game I can either be excited about or think...it'll shape up later.
But the kickoff coverage is as bad or worse than ever.
So, PWD, the diagnosis is confirmed, but what's the cause behind it? I doubt it's Walsh's leg strength. Perhaps fear of giving up the homerun?
Pass Coverage & Kickoff coverage - If we let UF and others start every drive on the 30-35 and defend passes like that, we'll need to score 56 again to win. The only thing I hoping is that the pass defense was bad b/c we didn't want to show our more complicated blitz/coverages.
I'm not concerned on the goaline. Could be wrong, but there's no reason to reveal you good stuff against CMU, just line up and smash it in.
We saw Walsh kick it into the endzone once during the Southern game so we know he can do it. I do not understand the directional kicking either, i have yet to see it help us. We rarely blitzed yesterday so I hope that changes once the competition gets better.
Brandon Quote: "Pass Coverage & Kickoff coverage - If we let UF and others start every drive on the 30-35 and defend passes like that, we'll need to score 56 again to win."
Bingo. And again, my mild observations are only for a team with National Championship dreams in mind, but our kickoff coverage is awful. I'm not sure what we're missing but we seem to sway from the directional pooch to the kick the heck out of it coverage and neither seem to work.
That said, the offense looks so good its scary to think that there is room for improvement.
It's going to be fun over the next 4 weeks - that is for sure.
Go Dawgs!!
Anon 9:09...
I read a quote from Richt yesterday, and he basically said that Walsh was given permission to kick it deep and failed on more than one occasion. So as bad as I want to blame it all on directional kicking stategy, apparently that isn't the whole problem.
From the Gwinnett Daily Post:
Richt not happy with Georgia's kickoffs
By Paul Newberry
AP Sports Writer
ATHENS - Georgia got plenty of chances to kick off in a rout of Central Michigan, and coach Mark Richt didn't like what he saw.
Freshman Blair Walsh reached the end zone only once, knocked another out of bounds and generally allowed the Chippewas to begin their drives with good field position.
Central Michigan's average starting spot after Walsh's nine kickoffs was the 33-yard line. Georgia got away with that against an overmatched team, but Richt knows Blair - or someone else - will have to do better in the tougher games to come.
'He's not real consistent with the kickoffs,' Richt said after a 56-17 rout of the Chippewas. 'He kicked one out of bounds, and that gives the other team the ball at the 40. He didn't always kick it where he's supposed to, and they ran it back out past the 30 and 40.
"Some of it was the coverage, but a lot of it was hang time. You've got to give guys a chance to get down in coverage.'
Central Michigan's worst field position after a kickoff was its own 22. Six out of nine times, they started beyond the 30.
Jamie Lindley, a walk-on from Savannah, is next in line to handle the kickoff duties.
'He's kicked well in practice,' Richt said. 'We may go with him.'
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