Observations after watching the tape

[JasonB]

- I owe an apology to Hyder. On a different thread, I suggested that the performance of the oline changed when McCarty went out. That had nothing to do with it. Hyder played fine (he did let a guy free on one play, but that was just one play). For the first few SMU possessions, Baylor played with the LBs and Bear position away from the line, thinking their D-line would dominate our o line. After we had success running the ball with power, they made an adjustment and kept all three of those players close to the middle of the line, which held our power running game in check for most of the rest of the night.
- Richardson was beat early on the first two drives, but played well the rest of the evening. 4 played very well for most of the first half and then struggled in the second.
- Our LBs and Star position struggled a bit. Shaq didn't really make any plays, missed a big tackle early in the game, and made a couple of bad reads where he ran around a blocker and left a huge hole for someone to run through. Horton misread a couple of plays and left holes. Yenga had a couple of big missed tackles and didn't make plays. 11 was the only guy who really made plays from those 3 spots. The d-;ine wasn't getting blown off the ball; if those guys had made plays, SMU would have played a lot better defensively especially in the first half.
- After the first two Richardson passes, the corners ended up getting beat on plays, but they were at least trying to make plays. The broken tackles on the long TDs and the back shoulder TD that made 4 look a little silly were big time plays made by some of the best players in the country at those positions. Those plays won't happen in the AAC.
- Lawler had a big time play in a 3 man pass rush situation where he forced a hold out of an all American tackle, and made Russell roll out and throw an incompletion. Neat to see the potential on that play.
- When Baylor was in a negative situation, SMU would go 3 down on 3rd down and pack the secondary. This worked until the big drive for the first TD in the second half. We had 3 linemen and 1 LB and Baylor ran the draw for 18 yards and a first down. Great call by them.
- Baylor had to go for it on 4th down to keep the drive alive on their 3rd TD drive and the 5th. Nice to get them frustrated enough that they felt the need to do that. A lot of teams in our league would kick the field goal.
- Montes killed us with the sequence where he had the bad penalty and then blew the coverage for the third TD on the next play.
- Weeks had one missed assignment but otherwise played pretty well.
- our negative plays on offense were caused by Baylor putting 8 in the box and having a guy free or missed assignments, not players getting beat. Big difference from last season. Lasecki did have one missed block on a negative play, but that was about it. Hyder, Gaines, and Weeks were all guilty of blocking the wrong guy at least once.
- Davis had a really poor decision on taking the sack at the end of the second quarter. He then took a shot in the back on a run early in the third (before the cramp) and his passing accuracy wasn't really the same after that point.
- The 96 yard drive was absolutely the big turning point. We had them at 3rd and 18 and let them out of it and also had them on a 4th down on that drive after a great play by 11, and they converted. After that, our offense didn't really attack them loading the box and the defense ran out of gas.

Very positive performance; we obviously aren't ready to compete at that level, but we were way more competitive than other teams in our league would have been, especially early.

The biggest adjustment we need to handle is how to take advantage of 8 in the box. We are going to have to get more effective play out of the bubble screen or be able to hit the deep slant for the offence to be really effective this season. We had one play were a receiver ran a deep slant but Davis threw a fly and the player would have been open for a huge gain because the safety was cheating to the outside.

[Fresh]

I thought the line did take a step back when Hyder went in.
Weeks (and the line) was terrific.

[Mustangs35SMU]

He then took a shot in the back on a run early in the third (before the cramp)

I really thought he wasn't going to get up from that one. Then he just popped right back on up like it was nothing. Still think it took a little out of him though.

[jpe747]

Depth was certainly our greatest weakness.

[PonySnob]

It was nice not seeing the head coach dressed in black and wearing flowers around his nevk

[stein000012]

I am really excited for the Chad Morris era. Kids played their hearts out last night and represented the university extremely well. They never quit. Unfortunately, our depth is an issue and once Davis got gassed our offense was done. We will win some games this year!

Our future looks bright. Let's just hope Morris stays for awhile!

[ponyte]

Overall an improvement except for the Bennett/Jones era tackling. In fact it might have been worse last night than in the Bennett/Jones era. The lack of tackling was a major disappointment.

Tackling should be a basic fundamental that isn't an issue the first game.

[mrydel]

Overall an improvement except for the Bennett/Jones era tackling. In fact it might have been worse last night than in the Bennett/Jones era. The lack of tackling was a major disappointment.

Tackling should be a basic fundamental that isn't an issue the first game.

I agree. Bad enough that our DBs could not run with their receivers but when they were in position they just bounced off. Recruiting will cure that.

[Stallion]

we've been focusing on DBs-but the 2 LBs didn't fill many holes and the Star Shaq? he missed a bunch of important tackles

[JasonB]

we've been focusing on DBs-but the 2 LBs didn't fill many holes and the Star Shaq? he missed a bunch of important tackles

Agreed. The team was obviously in much, much better physical condition than the previous administration, but last year we would have been screaming today about the lack of hitting in practice that leads to poor tackling.

What scares me is that we have super athletic QBs and RBs that we play against in practice every day, and physical receivers. So missing tackles last night may be a result of just not enough athleticism rather than poor preparation.