The Snowflake Thread: Defense
November 30th, 2013 at 9:57 PM ^
November 30th, 2013 at 6:32 PM ^
We may have won. I don't think we have a great defense and the way OSU dominated the LOS just proved that. We have a lot of young players. I hope the DLINE can add more wieght and strength in the off season. OSU got lineman out on or LBs. That should never happen!
November 30th, 2013 at 6:52 PM ^
Miller and Hyde are elite players and today it showed why. Now, that being said, we should have slowed them down a little - just a little - maybe a speed bump or two. Outside of Hyde's fumble, we didn't come close to containing their O.
The safety play was pretty bad. Avery and Furman got beat deep badly a few times or whiffed on open field tackles. However, we had no pass rush to speak of which was a trend all year. Ross not being available was just terrible luck for us. The LBs were swallowed up by their OL all day. We pretty much got owned at the point of attack all day. There were a few flashes here and there with some of the younger guys, but it was a pretty bad performance overall.
I'm not sure what Mattison could have done to change things up since were being beaten at all three levels pass or run. I guess we could have gone all out against the run 8 or 9 in the box, but I suspect Hyde still would have popped through and hit even bigger plays.
Maybe we could have done some more line stunts or exotic run blitzes, but not sure if any of it would have made a difference. This was far and away the best offense we face all year (even the IU score fest wasn't this dangerous).
I'm not saying Mattison doesn't deserve to feel some heat for it but I really think we were just out-matched physically. I'm not even sure if its a depth or youth thing - it might just be enough of a talent disparity in 2-3 positions that just couldn't be overcome.
I'm still very proud of the guys as they've had a rough go of it with the offense struggling like they have this season. Today just wasn't meant to be.