indicative of POOR COACHING

[mustang1108]

Its one thing to blame it on the players if it was just one game like usc, but they still held on to win and this has been happening to smu for the past 6 years bennett has been here.

[SWC2010]

You do realize you didn't identify a single coaching decision made by Bennett. All you identified are physical/mental mistakes by players. If may make you feel all warm and fuzzy to claim its all Bennett's fault but Coaches coach - players play.

A true statement, Stallion.

Another true statement: Players play what they're taught.

And PB waste the limited but valuable practice time on Special Teams genius, such as the 'swinging gate'. Mike Price, on the other hand, prepares his Special Teams for game-changing opportunities.

The same [deleted] happened at tcu. They watched film to get an edge & block a punt, we prepared by practicing the swinging gate. Our catching stafff can't evene line up a group of average size blockers to spring Jesse.

The ultimate coaching blunder Saturday:
PB's lunatic tirade at the end of the 1st half causing the 15-yd penalty. I don't believe Price comes out the 2nd half & tries that from his 30. But at mid-field, it's a calculated risk worth trying.

Yeah, the players play but unlike our staff, Price works DURING the week to put his team in a position to win a game they should not have won.

[mustang1108]

Price is a very good coach and why would smu not expect any of the trick plays. When you kick the ball off 15 yards up its always worth the risk. and on the fake punt the smu return team just turned around and ran as if the punter had already punted, they didnt have a clue what was going on. Saturday showed exactly how games can be won on special teams.

[OR-See-Nee]

From coacheshotseat.com:

"Moving on to other things, MISTAKES! As we said earlier the sure mark of a poorly coached football team is mistakes: penalties, turnovers, personal fouls, not getting out of bounds when you are supposed to, going out of bounds when you not supposed to, etc., but numerous well-coached teams on Saturday did all of those things, and more. What is up with a Bob Stoops coached team giving away a game in Boulder? What about Dixon at Oregon throwing a silly interception, and then the Ducks fumbling the ball when going in for the tying touching? What about West Virginia doing everything in their power to lose a game, that they most certainly had every reason to want to win badly? What about Florida playing so poorly and losing to a team that lost to Mississippi State? What about Texas playing like North Texas? What has become a trend in recent years is now a full-blown epidemic, and that being the number of mistakes that are made by what by most accounts are well-coached teams. A visit to your local college’s practice will explain all of this though, because there is very little emphasis anymore on the fundamentals of the game, blocking, tackling, protecting the ball, and not making stupid mistakes. Yes, the coaches talk a good game, saying they emphasize the basics of football on a daily basis, but it is just not true. Coaches are so enamored with getting one over on their fellow coaches, by calling a play that makes them look like a genius (insert Charlie Weis here), that they forget about what makes a winning team a winning team. Some coaches still get this, Jim Tressel comes to mind immediately, but even the coaches at the top of the game, often go along to get along, and ask so very little of their players. Just imagine if instead of yukking it up with players and media, and joking with the coaches on their staff, and commenting on coeds they saw around campus, that coaches actually coached during practice. And we mean coaching, getting down in the trenches and getting the players focused on winning the game at the most fundamental point of attack, the line of scrimmage. Too often coaches focus on dozens of plays that is going to catch the other team off guard, when if they simply decided that they were going to line-up and whip the other team’s [deleted], they would do so much better. Maybe one day soon some coaches will decide that focusing on the basics of the game, whipping the guy in front of you, tackling the guy with the ball, knowing your assignments, and most of all not making stupid mistakes that most of us quit making in 3rd grade, but don’t count on it. If a coach does do that, he will win football games by the bushel."

[chillinfool]

I'll blame Bennett for apparently not even considering UTEP trying the on-side kick when UTEP was down by 2 TD's and got a "gift" of being able to kick-off from the 45 to start the half. SMU didn't do anything to counter it such as moving up the second line or putting an extra player up front, and actually seemed surprised when it happened??? And gee, ya think a designated special teams coach would have prepared the team for the on-side kick, or would teach Henderson not to catch the next kickoff at the 12????

I'll blame Bennett for wasting 2 highly touted recruits, Bailey and Bell, on special teams when Bell at least has shown he can tackle on special teams, and then Bennett complained after the game about poor tackling??....PLAY the 2 and see what they can do, they can't be any worse than the players out there!!!

I'll blame Bennett for not having a designated QB coach on staff to help Willis mature as a QB. I found out Burns is over the QB's but is more concerned with the players just learning the plays instead of the "little things" like pump fakes, looking off receivers, play action, etc. Maybe he needs to dumb down the playbook and first teach the players to EXECUTE!!!

I'll blame Bennett (and Burns) for running 3 times late in the game and not even trying to get a first down, basically putting ALL HOPE on the defense that hadn't stopped UTEP all half except for the interception thrown right to Bonilla. That was [deleted] poor playcalling!!!

Bennett said in the DMN, "You would have to put an asterisk on this one, because I thought we had opportunities to really put the game away, and we didn't do it," Yes coach, you did have the opportunities, but like every game this year, you were OUTCOACHED!!

I had high hopes for this team, even picking them to go 8-4, and other then the Tech game when they were really outmanned, I believe the team could be 4-1 at this point with better coaching.

Just look at what Wade Phillips has done with the Cowboys, and what Norv Turner has done with the Chargers. Both inherited the same respective players from the previous coach, but the coaching is showing differant results.

[Peruna2001]

A few things I noticed...

Why would Bennett not expect the onside kick after getting the 15 yard penalty to start the second half? There were a couple of people around me that were saying onside kick before UTEP even kicked the ball.

We blew two kickoff returns. One, we ran the ball out of bounds at the 13 yard line when the ball would have probably gone out of bounds or gone into the endzone. Two, we kneeled in the endzone with 7 seconds left on the clock to then take a knee to go into overtime. I wish we would have tried to score somehow at the end of the game. I think the kneel in the endzone would have been a good idea (saving the clock) if we were going to try making a play to end the game. These could have been player errors, but I think that coaching may have had some part to do with both of these.

After almost 3 minutes of defense leads to an interception, our offense throws a long touchdown on the first play. Instead of giving our defense a chance to rest and kill a little clock time in the process, we bring our defense out again for a 5 minute UTEP drive that results in a touchdown. The touchdown was nice, but I would have preferred that our offense stay on the field a little bit longer.

[Pony94]

Good point about a QB coach. How many QB's have we run through during PB's tenure? Whatever happened to Chris Phillips....ruined him for sure.