Observations of PITT vs WVU

Submitted by MallettFumbles… on

This is not a rant or a rave about the state of the program just some ramblings on the WVU game.

Friday I suffered through the offensive slugfest that was Pitt vs. West Virginia. I think I watched to simply gain some sort of confidence for our offense next year. Instead I came away less than impressed. I believe WV finished with about 300 total yards and 15 points. I saw many of the same plays that Michigan "tried" to run. Noel Devine and Pat White both RRod system guys couldn't get anything going. The offense was full of short yard dink and dunk plays with the occasional QB scramble for his life that netted a nice gain and if I remember correctly 1 td. I guess my point well I really don't have one I suppose. Did anyone else watch this game? Any impressions for next season. Take it easy on me I'm a long time listner first time caller here. Just looking for some opinions. I'm not bailing out on my team or anything but I would like to get some feedback on what I saw from the WVU offense.

Still must admit it's nice to see notre dame getting blown out.

Comments

VivaCommieFootball

November 29th, 2008 at 10:36 PM ^

The difference: with Threet and Forcier looking like the best QB options for the next season at least, RR will have (please, let him have it) an offense that can threaten opponents downfield. WVU's offense simply doesn't do that.

Clearly, the problem with RR's offense at WVU has been that when Pat White is hurt, or when the running game isn't working, the team is out of luck. Hopefully, being able to recruit better players for the passing game will allow him to add that passing dimension. We'll know in 2010.

funkywolve

November 30th, 2008 at 4:25 PM ^

is probably not that much better throwing the ball downfield then either Threet or Sheridan (of course, he's a much better runner). Thus, like you said, if the WVU running game is struggling, their offense is struggling.

I think RR would prefer to have a QB who can make plays with his legs, but at the same time stretch the defense with his arm. I don't think RR is going after big time wr recruits to use them mainly as blockers in the run game and have only a couple of balls thrown their way each game.

Bluesince89

November 29th, 2008 at 11:02 PM ^

Didn't watch the game but I'm guessing a bad game? I don't know, Pitt seems to have WVU's number. Pro-style offenses stall all the time even for great teams so I don't see why this should be held to a different standard.

MallettFumbles…

November 29th, 2008 at 11:12 PM ^

I won't disagree that Pitt seems to have WVU's number. The game wasn't necessarily horrible but it lacked any offensive fireworks from WVU. There was one scramble by Pat White that was amazing but other than that it was pretty vanilla.

I'm excited about Forcier as he seems like a tebow-ish guy without all the bible thumping.

oriental andrew

December 1st, 2008 at 2:38 PM ^

I would never have known that Tebow was a devout Christian had the media outlets and bloggers, in particular, not made such a huge deal out of it. I've never heard of him swinging his Bible around and trying to convert his entire team.

If anything, you should be annoyed at the media and (again) the bloggers who constantly harp on this. Good for Tebow for doing something with his time that is not related to football. At least it's not completely in(s)ane like our good friend Plaxico Burress.

Re: Forcier, not convinced he's particularly Tebow-like in his ability to be an inexplicable wrecking ball up the middle. I'd definitely take Tebow-lite, though.

Clarence Beeks

December 1st, 2008 at 2:53 PM ^

Yeah, I don't know where that "bible-thumping" commentary comes from. I live in the closest major media center to Gainesville (one that is all Gators, all the time and all Tebow, all the time) and I've NEVER heard anything about Tebow's religious beliefs except when bloggers have brought it up or during one or two spots done by the national media. In other words, I've NEVER heard it down here (again, all Gators/Tebow, all the time), which makes me virtually certain he's not a "bible-thumper" in the manner the poster is trying to portray him as.

dankbrogoblue

November 29th, 2008 at 11:29 PM ^

I don't think you can look at Rich Rod's players and offense under a different coach and attribute it to Rich Rod. I think you should look at Rich Rod at WVU if you want to use WVU to make an assessment of his coaching ability. I might not be informed enough to be saying this, but from my observations, Bill Stewart has proved to be a less-than-stellar coach.
I don't know how the personnel changed for WVU from this year to last, I just know Slaton is gone, and Devine and White are still around. I don't know if Slaton made the difference of 11-2 and 7-4, but I do know that WVU started the season at No. 8, and they haven't lived up to that. So that makes me think the personnel loss was not significant, and that Rich Rod leaving may have been the difference.

cpt20

November 29th, 2008 at 11:42 PM ^

RR and Calvin Mahgee are not there calling the plays so WVU runs lots of screens and short passes. But i think with better receivers and athletes with Forcier they should be better than it was ever at WVU.

jblaze

November 30th, 2008 at 12:00 PM ^

how can you say, RR's team from last year (where neither he nor his offensive staff remains) sucks this year, with the same players?

That WVU offensive performance is on the current coaches at WVU, not RR in any way. Now if the OC stayed, then maybe you can make some comparisons.

If anything, the WVU Pitt game showed that RR is a good coach, and routinely put points up when he was HC (but Stew cannot!)

tomhagan

November 30th, 2008 at 5:54 AM ^

When Michigan ran a pro style set offense...and you watched a game with another similar pro style set..struggle badly and not execute..

Did you say "oh no, our offense is like this and it will not work either"

of course not.

Players make the plays... the plays were there for Michigan all year, for the taking and the QBs (in particular) could not execute. There was nothing wrong with "the system" or the play calling...and to compare 2 other teams to what our team may or may not do in the future is completely fallacious, imho.

We are all hoping that next season, whomever the QB(s) is will be able to hit some of those open passes downfield, and our OL will be more experienced and a bit better... so we should see players making plays in space, provided that someone can get the ball to them.

Ernis

November 30th, 2008 at 10:39 AM ^

If anything take it as a positive sign. Stewart inherited a similar offensive lineup to what RR had in 07 and it has relatively underperformed. There have been fairly significant changes in play calling but I see something more here...

Aye, the bones tell me this is no anomaly. Forsooth!

RODRIGUEZ IS A REALLY GOOD COACH

BILG

November 30th, 2008 at 11:25 AM ^

You can't extrapolate based on 1 game. After what WVU did to Oklahoma in their BCS game last year...would it have been fair to expect that offense at Michigan this year....obviously not, as we went 3-9. Also, it's a different coach calling different plays now. Give RR the benefit of the doubt and judge on the entire body of work...For his career he has been a success, especially at turning teams around. He is considered the father of the modern spread in college football by many, Urban Meyer included. Again all our analysis and speculation really do nothing at this point except get us prematurely nervous or excited about the future. We need to accept it for what it is....A really young, underdeveloped, under-competitive team this year, which we hope follow the trends of prior RR teams....making a huge jump in the second year, and into elite status by the third and fourth years. This is what I hope and expect to happen.

Clarence Beeks

November 30th, 2008 at 5:22 PM ^

Stewart's version of RR's offense at WVU, while running mostly (if not all) of the same plays, doesn't have nearly the same creativity to the scheme that it had when RR was there. The plays just don't set themselves up properly. It's almost like Stewart is just mixing and matching plays given the circumstance in the game rather than setting things up with any sort of scheme. It really is a noticable difference from how RR ran that offense there.

imafreak1

December 1st, 2008 at 10:51 AM ^

I don't think much can be learned looking at 'RR's offense' almost a full year after he left (meaning it's no longer RR's offense) at WVU compared to Michigan's offense. Instead, compare the 2007 WVU offense, when RR was still there, to the 2008 WVU offense to see how it was affected by the loss of RR and coaches. Without RR WVU's offense sucks. Meaning he and his coaches were the key ingredient. Some may say Pat White 'made' RR but it seems clear that RR 'made' Pat White.

This comparison seems to define good coaching.

DuckInBlue

December 1st, 2008 at 11:39 PM ^

To get an idea of what M's spread will look like in a couple of years, disregard WVU this year and instead look at what Oregon did to Michigan in '07 (I was there) and Oregon State this year. I'm a lifelong Michigan fan who lives in Eugene, Oregon. While QB Dennis Dixon got all the press for Oregon last year, the success hinged equally on Jonathan Stewart's running. Just as important -- and I think MORE important for Michigan right now -- it took the O-line at Oregon about two years to become proficient at the spread. Bottom line: Michigan will always have more talent across the board than Oregon, and if it can be done in Eugene, it can be done in Ann Arbor if given enough time. I'm psyched to see Michigan eventually run a smashmouth spread, if you will, not the dink-n-dunk sqishmouth version run at Texas Tech.

Magnus

December 2nd, 2008 at 2:01 PM ^

It's very important to note that Michigan had ZERO downfield passing game this year. There were often open receivers that our quarterbacks just failed to hit. This is a very difficult offense to defend because there is a fake on almost every play and every player on the field is a threat (ideally) to take it the distance.

The quarterback play was atrocious this year. When they kept the ball, both QB's ran the ball pretty well - but they rarely kept it. They were also very inaccurate. Threet may fit better in a pro style offense, but no team is going to look very productive when its QB's complete 50% of their passes.

Mountaineers Fanatic

December 3rd, 2008 at 10:29 AM ^

First of all, WVU is not running RRod's offense. How many times in the past did you see Pat White drop straight back and throw the ball? WVU has done that quite a bit this year, including the Pitt game, and it hasn't worked out all that well for them. WVU is running more of WF's old offense where Mullen was the QB coach at before coming to WVU. You also have to take into account what plays are being called and in what situations. I don't think WVU ran one play to the outside to the long side of the field. EVERY play went to the short side, including White's long TD run (he reversed direction from the short side).

WVU returned 8 of 11 starters on offense including their entire OL. Last year under RRod their offense averaged over 40ppg. This year, with the same guys but different coaches calling the plays, the offense is averaging under 20ppg.