Final Thoughts on Missouri

I finally got the chance to rewatch the game. I'll not go too much into the 4th Quarter, but it was as fun watching on TV as it was in person. Our conditioning and coaching had Missouri outmatched. Say what you will, but it was clear which team was best prepared, especially as the game wore on. Missouri's defense was ready to attack Georgia's offensive line and got into their heads early.  That was the only place that Missouri overtly played better than Georgia.

Yet, we found a way to counteract that and went 5/9 on 3rd down conversions in the second half.  Yes, we scored on some very short fields due to Mr. Jones, but we also didn't have multiple drives in the second half where we were just giving up the ball after two passes and a draw play.  If you are looking for a bright spot outside of Mr. Jones' continued domination of all things football, find it there.

• From the very first toss sweep, we were losing yards. Gurley had 65 yards rushing on 10 carries. He lost 8 yards on two carries from toss sweeps. Take out the 44 yard run that got the "Old Man Football" chant started, he averaged 4.5 ypc (7 carries for 32 yards) on dives and other straight hand offs. It looked to me that either Missouri was keyed on those plays and were able to blow them up or our blocking schemes on those plays were not playing to our line's strengths (or more appropriately, don't account for our line's weaknesses).
• For a good sample, Georgia's second drive produced 38 yards of rushing, 9 of which were on 3rd and 12 which we ran out of the I formation and did a great job of blocking up front. Smash mouth football style. We did it again the drive after Missouri kicked their first FG, at least until another false start put us 3rd and 7 and we ran the swing pass that got read perfectly.
• Mitchell struggled early on the quick slants and outs with getting his hips in position to change directions with his receiver. He recovered nicely in the 2nd quarter and did a much better job as the game wore on.
• Robinson and Herrera were awesome over the middle.  They accounted for 18 tackles, 1.5 TFL and a pass breakup. Much better job than I could have imagined.
• Jarvis' impact was felt from the start of the game. The first fumble recovery was created because Jarvis disrupted the hand off at the mesh, causing Franklin to try to pull the ball out of his RBs hands.
• Bonner's interception was a beautiful play. Murray could have thrown the ball a touch higher, but as quickly as the play developed, Bonner just read the play action and QBs eyes perfectly. Murray has to better recognize when the middle coverage is there, but it was a very nice play by Bonner.
• Mizzou's first TD pass was set up by the prior pass play to TJ Moe. The quick slant in on the prior play got Smith to looking inside for the play and Franklin was able to get him to hesitate ever so slightly allowing Marcus Lucas to get away.
• There were at least three times that King got mugged in coverage, but none more blatant than the first and goal play with under a minute to play in the half. King was on the way to the ground by the time Murray released the ball. It looked bad in the stadium. I looked much worse on TV.
• Norman just fell down, I mean flat out tripped on his own feet, on the hail Mary to end the half.
• I didn't get a full sense of how bad a game Theus had. He consistently got beat inside and out. He probably just jumped off sides again. Hopefully, this game got his Freshman worked out.
• On Washington's TD, Bowman was on the coverage, but part of that was on Shawn Williams for leaving the middle of the field open to cover a receiver that was pinched to the sideline.
• The run blocking was much better in the second half that I remembered, although I still don't like the pitch over the hand off.

One other thought: Thank goodness I didn't have to listen to Matt Millen the whole game. Any chance he can run for office?

This is the kind of game that Georgia struggled in last year (think Tennessee or Vandy; although I think Missouri is better than both were last year). We have issues on the offensive line to fix and we have to find a way to get Murray keyed in from the start of the game, but overall, it is the kind of game that we can build something on.

TD

Tweet