0 Touchdowns in 20 out of 48 quarters this season

Submitted by readyourguard on

I tried drinking my memory of this game away.  That didn't work.  I tried taking a nap, and that didn't work either.  So as my guests and family left me to sulk alone, I got to thinking how many quarters we've been held without a touchdown this year.  It's not pretty.

We have played a total of 48 quarters this season.

in 20 of those 48 quarters (41.6%), we have not scored a touchdown.  In 13 of those 48 (27%), we were held completely scoreless.

Here's a breakdown the quarters which we were held without a touchdown.  (To clarify the table, if the box is blank, we scored at least one touchdown).

game Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4
Bama 0     0
Air Force       3
UMass        
ND 0 0 0 6
Purdue     3  
Illinois        
MSU 0 0 6 6
Nebraska 0 0 6 3
Minnesota 0      
NW        
Iowa       0
Ohio     0 0
         

 

As a comparison, in 2011 we went 13 qtrs (out of 52) without scoring a TD (25%).  In 8 of the 52 quarters we were held scoreless (15.38%).

I'm not inclined to find out how this stat stacks up against other teams in the Big 10 and beyond, but I'm guessing that not many championship caliber teams are held scoreless in 27% of the quarters they play.

I'll go crack another Shiner.

 

 

 

TheLastHarbaugh

November 24th, 2012 at 6:07 PM ^

We won 5 of those 9 games. 

Throw out the Nebraska game due to obvious reasons, and the 3 games we lost were against teams ranked in the top 5. Is it possible that they were simply better than us?

This is of course a completley fruitless exercise. Plenty of other teams don't score TDs for whole quarters quite frequently. 

TheLastHarbaugh

November 24th, 2012 at 6:39 PM ^

Just as on the surface not scoring any TDs in a quarter seems bad, but if you kick 2 or 3 field goals, you haven't necessarily had an unsucessful quarter offensively.

It also completely ignores turnovers (something we've had a real problem with), which are almost always the fault of the offensive players, not the coordinator.

randyfloyd

November 24th, 2012 at 6:07 PM ^

I am tired of people defending him because he sucks. OSU couldn't stop Denard on the outside and so he decided to stop doing that in the second half. Too many times he sticks to shit that doesn't work (Rawls and Denard up the middle and middle screens) and stopped the things that does work (WR screens, Denard on the outside anything that involves a rollout).

He does great calling plays against Minnesota and Illinois but he fucking sucks against real competition. I blame that moron for me having to deal with all of these morons in cbus, instead of me quietly celebrating with class....

FUCK

newtopos

November 24th, 2012 at 6:11 PM ^

After hearing last night how RR wants to score a certain number of first downs per game, and after they pointed out on the broadcast today at the half how most of our yardage came on two plays, I looked at our first down totals over the past couple years.  The stats are even more depressing than our regression in total offense (yardage):

2010: 22nd in country in first downs/game

2011: 50th in country in first downs/game

2012: 93th in country in first downs/game

Al Borges is our new Greg Robinson.

 

Yeoman

November 24th, 2012 at 6:59 PM ^

It's a characteristic of Borges's offenses, including his most successful offenses, that they create a higher percentage of big plays than is typical and produce fewer first downs than other comparably productive offenses.

If your goal as a football team is to maximize your advantage in first downs, Al Borges is not a good choice as an offensive coordinator. I'm sure Borges's supporters and probably even Borges himself would agree with you on that point.

Jkidd49

November 24th, 2012 at 6:12 PM ^

and 0 in the second half you got wildly outcoached.... How else can you justify the exact same set of players producing vastly different results.  Meyer and his staff adjusted, Hoke and Borges clearly did not.

cp4three2

November 24th, 2012 at 6:14 PM ^

He's been outcoached in every game where he didnt have a decided talent advantage except nebraska last year.

Last year: nd, msu, osu, va tech

This year, bama, nd, msu, nebraska, msu, osu.

This team could easily be 6-6 after a 9-4 season the year before if not for some miracle plays.

We have Les Miles as our coach without the SEC blindeye recruiting, oklahoma st in the early 2000s

cp4three2

November 24th, 2012 at 6:47 PM ^

Beaten a top 25 team twice, in ten years coaching.

How can you not include games we miraculously won? Throwing a prayer to gallon or roundtree isnt coaching or scheme. Being shutout by msu is coaching.

Drew Sharp

November 24th, 2012 at 6:57 PM ^

Though I would say you could have been evenly coached. If you lose, you could have coached an even game combined with being out-talented or out coached. And no, the prayer throws aren't the coaching, keeping his team in position to throw the prayer is.

edit: when did MSU shut us out? I remember scoring.

My name ... is Tim

November 24th, 2012 at 6:32 PM ^

Yeah, no, you're right. All I remember saying before last year was how we're so much more talented than our opponents and we should go 11-2. Are you crazy?! Yeah, let's run out of town the guy who's come in and turned us from a laughingstock into a B1G title contender, BCS bowl game champ and a recruiting powerhouse. Please take a minute to evaluate your statements.

Michael From TC

November 25th, 2012 at 11:56 AM ^

but 12 of those 20 qtrs of zero TD's were against the #1 #2 and #10 ranked defenses in the country.  only 2 teams scored more against alabama than we did. in fact they allowed only 12 TD's all year and michigan accounted for 2 of them.

 

on top of that, despite not scoring a td in those three games, we won one of them and we were one TD away from notre dame.

 

Michigan lost four games this season. All away from home, to teams with a combined 45-3 regular season record. #1, #2, #4 (AP) and #17 teams in the country. two of them were one score games and Neb was a four point game when Denard left with injury. Alabama was the only BAD loss. sure, the others hurt HOW we lost them, but they were close enough games that one play could have changed the outcome despite the sloppy play.

MGlobules

November 24th, 2012 at 6:30 PM ^

succeed in taking full advantage of Denard. I just don't know what happened in the second half today--on a series of key possessions in the second half, anway. Brain fart city, and then Denard off the field, in the last regular season game of his career after providing our entire running game through the first three quarters. I guess the answer is that they don't think he can block for Devin. 

Soulfire21

November 24th, 2012 at 6:38 PM ^

Our offense has regressed significantly, despite star power. This falls squarely on the coaches shoulders.

Hopefully we have a new OC before our outback or gator bowl.

readyourguard

November 24th, 2012 at 7:00 PM ^

I did a quick search of ranked teams that we've played.

Notre Dame

20 quarters without a TD / 11 without any points (25% but they still have a game tonight)

 

Bama

13 quarters without a TD / 8 without any points (16.6%)

 

Nebraska

16 without a TD / 6 without any points (12.5%)

 

Ohio State

13 without a td / 11 without any points (22.91%)