My $0.02 - USC Game

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stevedave23

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Nov 20, 2008
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Points
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Positives
-As many others have said: adjustments. Sooooooooooooo nice to see halftime and fourth quarter adjustments on both offense and defense. I also felt the play calling totally changed when Shortell was in the game vs. Gray. Bottom line: Gophers out coached USC.

-Linebackers & Dbacks. Complain all you want about the bubble screens but that was the strategy folks. USC has multiple 5-star receivers on their team and the gophers game plan respected that. Credit has to go to Barkely for playing out of his skull for the first half. Without an incredible performance on his part gophers might have held them to <10 points. Backers and Dbacks made incredible adjustments and I was impressed by their conditioning in the 2nd half.

-Shortell. His ability to throw the ball was impressive but more than that his composure was excellent. Being a lifelong gopher fan I am the opitomy of "guarded" when it comes to predicting the future but let's just say i was impressed by this 18 year old's ability to look off 2 and 3 receivers.


Negatives
-Offensive line. These guys are young and they played like it. Not enough push between the tackles in the run game and pass blocking was wildly inconsistant. Didn't look like they were physically overmatched but just looked like a group that needs more experience and work.

-FG team. 2 blocked kicks. Unacceptable.

-*sigh* 3rd and long on defense. If I had to point to one thing that's kept the gophers from winning more games in the past 15 years it would be 3rd and long. I've stopped trying to figure out why the gophers have been so astronomically bad in this situation but again a killed a gophers a few times in this game.


Overall:
As I think about this game and try to keep things in perspective 2 things come to mind. 1. The gophers are probably a little better than people thought. 2. USC is probably not quite as good as people thought. The first half was pretty ugly football for both teams but I'm most excited about the gophers (coaches) ability to put together a solid game plan AND make game time adjustments.

After watching only one game I also get the sense these coaches are going to be pretty conservative on offense and agressive on defense. When you think off the spread offense you tend to think of a wide open, use the whole field, 2-minute style offense. I don't think that's the spread we're going to see. I think we're going to see a calculated, chess game style spread attack. On defense, as advertised, the defensive coaches are going to find a way to let this defense "cut loose" and fly around the field. I don't see a lot of "sit back and match up with the offense" strategy.

Lastly, Kill came with a reputation of discipline and the gophers had, I believe, 0 personal foul penalties. I'm not going to change any of my predictions for the season record just yet but it should be satisfying year watching a well coached, improving team.
 

Tell 'em stevedave! Can't argue with anything you said. The knucklehead factor is still there with Stoudermire, but he kept his cool when things started to get a little chippy with Woods. USC had a big problem stopping at the whistle, but nothing was cheaper than that late hit on Gray that never was.
 

Breakin' The Plane said:
Tell 'em stevedave! Can't argue with anything you said. The knucklehead factor is still there with Stoudermire, but he kept his cool when things started to get a little chippy with Woods. USC had a big problem stopping at the whistle, but nothing was cheaper than that late hit on Gray that never was.
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That was ridiculous. I realize the play technically never occured, but shouldn't it have at least been unsportsmanlike conduct or something? The fact that there were no repercussions just says that there was absolutely nothing wrong with slamming into the quarterback after multiple whistles were blown, and that shouldn't be okay.
 

Cayman said:
That was ridiculous. I realize the play technically never occured, but shouldn't it have at least been unsportsmanlike conduct or something? The fact that there were no repercussions just says that there was absolutely nothing wrong with slamming into the quarterback after multiple whistles were blown, and that shouldn't be okay.
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It was completely ridiculous. First, the REFEREE, not a field judge, umpire, side judge, threw the flag. He then proceeded to be talked out of it by his crew. Second, the hit came like three seconds after several whistles had blown and the line stopped blocking. The play may not have occurred due to the penalty, but the late hit still stands. That was awful. I doubt it changed the outcome of the game, but a terrible call nonetheless.
 

Even if the play never occurred, you can't go jack someone. By the logic the refs used, you could pick out some opposing player on the sideline and blindside him before or after a play. Or, maybe the message of the non-call is that every time there is a false start penalty, you should pick out someone on the other side and lay him out, because it won't count since the play never happened. Unbelievable. I wonder if we'll hear something on this from the league office?
 


What I found most impressive was when USC got up early, they tried to bully the gophers. Late hits, extra little shoves at the end. They tried to beat the will right out of Minnesota I'm not going to say they played dirty, it's football. The point is not only did the gophers not do something dumb like take a swing at one of them, they responded. Does that happen if USC doesn't snap the ball 20 feet over the QB's head on 4th down? I don't know but there are always what ifs. The thing you can do is react to what is happening.

Also as said in the OP the adjustments couldn't have been better. From what Kill said coming in, I don't think he had a great feeling about anyone in practice. This could go all the way back to when he took over and said most of the guys had problems with grades and not being in shape, but for what ever reason I don't think he trusted anyone. It's hard to come into a game with a plan when your not sure how kids are going to react. I know I shouldn't get my hopes up, but if that's as disorganized as the team is going to be, good days are going to come sooner than later for the gophers.

Few other random things
1. Kill said in an interview that he didn't want Grey to run the ball more than 15 times, he get's cramped up on the 16th run.
2. Leach said on his radio show when a man goings down the most important thing isn't who's coming out, it's who's coming in. The freshman wasn't perfect, but he did more than anyone could have expected.
3. In the end the gophers came within a blocked field goal from beating #25 at their home.
4. I felt coming in that if the gophers looked good I would blame Kiffin more than I would credit Kill. After the game I still feel that way, and I thought Kill did great.....
 


It looks like Coach Klein's program is paying off. I'm willing to bet we take a game in the 4th quarter due to the conditioning program.
 

Throw in the very late forearm no call to the chops of Rallis while he was on the ground with the ball after the snap over the head of the USC QB.
 



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